RNW Staff

Jack Butel contested his first race meeting of 2019, with the Jerseyman traveling to the Middle East to contest the Dubai 24 hours with new team Optimum Motorsport in its Ginetta G55 GT4 sports car. Butel will be driving for the English team this season and used the desert curtain raiser to familiarise himself with his new surroundings.

Christian Fittipaldi will close out his illustrious driving career when he returns to Mustang Sampling Racing for the 57th Anniversary Rolex 24 At Daytona, ending a 31-year career for the 48-year-old native of Sao Paulo, Brazil.

The 2019 ABB FIA Formula E Marrakesh E-Prix saw a brave start from Jean-Éric Vergne who launched for the lead into turn one from his P2 start position. Unfortunately, the attempt was just on the limit and the Frenchman spun out. Nevertheless, this didn’t stop the reigning Formula E champion who quickly worked his way through the grid to end P5 at the checkered flag.

Nissan e.dams test and reserve driver Mitsunori Takaboshi and simulator driver Jann Mardenborough impressed in Morocco with an opportunity to climb behind the wheel of the Nissan e.dams’ Formula E cars.

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The first endurance highlight of the season ended in great success for BMW customer racing teams. The excellent performance of the BMW M4 GT4 in particular stood out at the Dubai 24 Hour (UAE).

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McLaren have “taken some measures” to boost reliability ahead of February’s first pre-season test, says CEO Zak Brown. Last year, their first with Renault power, McLaren were dogged by reliability issues in testing. McLaren suffered five separate breakdowns over the course of a troubled eight days although a late surge saw Fernando Alonso finished second fastest overall. The Woking team covered just 599 laps, fewer than Sebastian Vettel managed alone. This year Brown says they are taking steps to avoid a repeat performance. “I don’t want to share in detail some of the things we’re doing differently this off-season than we did last season,” he told RACER. “We are doing things differently, to be more prepared, not just with performance but we had a lot of reliability issues going into Barcelona testing last year. So we have taken some measures to get ahead of that. “We will continue to develop as all F1 teams do, on a weekly basis, and we’ll bring to Australia our most developed performance that we’ve been doing here since we started developing the car and having reliability programs to make sure [it is better]. “One of the reasons why we were slower to bring performance (in 2018) is because we had reliability issues. “You roll off the truck in Barcelona, instead of being able to get straight down to performance, you’re having issues — wheel nut issues, heating issues — you then stop focusing on performance and you start focusing on reliability. “The team did a good job to give us reliability coming out of Spain testing, to have cars both finish in the points in Australia. “We’re in a better place performance wise and reliability coming into winter testing.”

Their mission was never in any doubt. Conditions were perfect, and the start went absolutely according to plan. GRT Grasser Racing intended to win the 24 Hours of Dubai at the third attempt, but things turned out differently in the end. After 24 exciting hours filled with stress, Lamborghini works driver Mirko Bortolotti together with Christian Engelhart and Rolf and Mark Ineichen, crossed the finish line in fourth place, which sounds disappointing, considering original expectations, but in actual fact, the result was stunning and only made possible by a sensational charge up the field and a terrific team effort.

Nissan e.dams demonstrated strong pace but suffered ill-fortune in the second round of the ABB FIA Formula E Championship in Marrakesh today.

The second race of the 2018/19 ABB FIA Formula E season showed pace, performance but only delivered a couple of points for Panasonic Jaguar Racing in Marrakesh.

Courtesy of customer team Envision Virgin Racing, Audi became the first manufacturer to achieve a double podium with the new generation of Formula E race cars. In the second round of the ABB FIA Formula E Championship in Marrakesh (Morocco), all four Audi e-tron FE05 cars finished in the points. In addition to positions two, three, seven and ten, the extra points for pole position and the fastest race lap also went to the Audi e-tron FE05.

After victory in the season-opener, BMW i Andretti Motorsport continued to put on a strong performance in the second race of the ABB FIA Formula E Championship – but without the reward of a similar result this time. At the Marrakesh E-Prix, Alexander Sims (GBR) finished fourth to score the first points of his Formula E career, just missing out on the podium in a thrilling finale. António Félix da Costa (POR) retired after sliding into the tyre wall after contact with Sims. Sims lost two places but was able to continue racing.

German team Car Collection Motorsport is the winner of the 2019 Hankook 24H DUBAI. With the #88 Audi R8 LMS GT3, drivers Dirk Parhofer, Christopher Haase, Frédéric Vervisch and Rik Breukers racked up a total of 607 laps of the 5.390 metres long Dubai Autodrome to win the opening round of the 2019 Championship of the Continents in the 24H GT SERIES powered by Hankook. 20-year old Dutch hotshoe Rik Breukers drove the Audi across the finish line and said: “What a race! I am so happy for the team, for Audi and myself! I drove for nine and a half hours. It was tough, but this win is a great reward.”

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The KC Motorgroup Ltd. (KCMG) Honda enjoyed a strong start to the Dubai 24 Hour, but a fire during the night forced them into retirement. Driver Andy Yan thankfully managed to avoid injury and the cause of the fire is not yet known.

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At 15.00 hrs today, the 2019 Hankook 24H DUBAI got underway at Dubai Autodrome as His Highness Sheikh Juma Bin Maktoum Al Maktoum and His Excellency Mohammed Khalfan Alrumaithi, Chairman of the General Authority of Sport, waved the flag of the United Arab Emirates to send off the 74-car field. The 14th running of the first international endurance race of the new calendar year marks the start of the Championship of the Continents in the 24H GT SERIES and the 24H TCE SERIES, both powered by Hankook.