RNW Staff

Jeffrey Lee produced a defensive masterclass at Suzuka en route to his and Craft-Bamboo Racing co-driver Alessio Picariello’s second Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia victory of the season this morning.

Nissan e.dams Swiss racer Sebastien Buemi scored a podium on home soil today in the ABB FIA Formula E championship by finishing third on the streets of Bern.

Panasonic Jaguar Racing driver Mitch Evans finished second in the Swiss E-Prix in Bern to achieve his second ABB FIA Formula E podium. The Kiwi fought a race-long battle with Jean-Eric Verge and a last-minute rain shower to power him to fourth in the driver standings. Mathematically he still has a chance to win the Formula E title at the season five finale in New York next month.

BMW i Andretti Motorsport was unable to back up the strong performances last time out at the team’s home race in Berlin (GER) as the European leg of this season’s ABB FIA Formula E Championship drew to a close in Bern (SUI). António Félix da Costa (POR) and Alexander Sims (GBR) finished 12th and 14th at the Swiss E-Prix.

At the first E-Prix in the Swiss capital Bern, Audi Sport ABT Schaeffler scored points with both cars. However, in the Formula E title race, the team suffered a setback.

The Porsche customer teams have started successfully into the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring. The nine-eleven (#911) fielded by Manthey-Racing with Kévin Estre (France), Michael Christensen (Denmark), Earl Bamber (New Zealand) and Laurens Vanthoor (Belgium) had taken up the race from position three and have now settled in amongst the leading pack. The No. 31 Porsche 911 GT3 R campaigned by Frikadelli Racing initially dropped out of the top ten. However, the crew consisting of Matt Campbell (Australia), Mathieu Jaminet (France), Romain Dumas (France) and Sven Müller (Germany) put in fast lap times to rejoin the top group. Bad luck plagued last year’s winners Patrick Pilet, Frédéric Makowiecki (both France), Richard Lietz (Austria) and Nick Tandy (Great Britain). While leading, their 500+hp Manthey-Racing nine-eleven with the starting number 1 lost 4:30 minutes due to a puncture. They are now battling their way back up through the field. 

Anderson Tanoto and Mark Williamson took their Absolute Racing-entered Audi R8 LMS GT4 to a debut podium finish in today’s round five of Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia. Tanoto crossed the line third in class following a strong fightback from the pair after falling to dead last on the first lap of the race at the legendary Suzuka Circuit in Japan.

Tanart Sathienthirakul and Philip Hamprecht led an Absolute Racing one-two and podium clean sweep for Porsche in this weekend’s first Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia race at Suzuka earlier today.

Martin Rump and Alessio Picariello secured Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia pole positions for Audi Sport Asia Team Absolute and Craft-Bamboo Racing at Suzuka earlier today, while BMW Team Studie’s Takayuki Kinoshita and Sunako Jukuchou topped the GT4 times on home soil.