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MALVEIRO WINS WET PORTUGUESE ENCOUNTER FOR SERPENT (30/05/2006)
- By:
- Laurant
Report by Ricardo Nogueira
New track layout, and new track surface at Sintra. Very fast outside part of the track with 4 straights and 2 turns full throttle, that made fuel consumption almost impossible to reach the 5 minutes in the heats. And then very slow inside part, making it difficult to set the transmission on the car. The surface, made of a very closed tarmac, had almost no tyre wear, with a 37 shore set running for lots of time. With lots of grip the track was very smooth with no bumps at all.
Ricardo Nogueira was the best Serpent driver after the heats with the 2nd place mark. João Sousa placed his Serpent 5th and Cláudio Lopes 6th. Malveiro with the fuel consumption problem only made 12th.
17 drivers attended the race, so everybody goes to the semis. Nogueira won the first semi, with Lopes 4th and Malveiro 5th having to wait for the result of the other semi. In the second semi, Sousa made 3rd, Gonçalo Almeida 4th and Fernando Dantas was in a good position to go to the final when his engine flames out at 16 and a half minutes. He had to quit.
With a sunny Saturday and a cloudy Sunday, nobody predicted this end. The main final starts with Bruno Coelho, António Teixeira and João Malveiro leading the way. At 10 minutes of race, the rain starts to fall slowly, making the very rubbered slow turns very slippery. Nogueira starts a drifting show, as the rain began to fall heavier, and he was the last one to change to wet tyres. At 20 minutes, 4 drivers were already out, with receivers and engines damaged and even a hit in the wall by Sousa after his receiver went dead, twisted his chassis like i never seen before. The fuel tank blown due to the shrinking in the radio plate.
Amazing at 25 minutes, race director decides to stop the race, because the track was not flowing the water due to the closed tarmac, and conditions were almost impossible. Surviver João Malveiro won with a 2 lap lead, and Ricardo Nogueira with a dead receiver in the last lap made it 4th. Gonçalo Almeida was 5th, João Sousa 6th and Cláudio Lopes was 7th, the last of the 5 Serpent cars in the main final.
Race Result (Sintra)
1. João Malveiro - 57 laps 25:41.494
2. Hugo Exposto - 55 laps 25:14.668
3. Bruno Coelho - 54 laps 23:29.950
4. Ricardo Nogueira - 54 laps 24:54.903
5. Gonçalo Almeida - 49 laps 25:42.010
6. João Sousa - 47 laps 21:11.978
7. Cláudio Lopes - 44 laps 26:31.925
8. Luís Cortez - 42 laps 24:09.808
9. Tó Teixeira - 16 laps 11:52.323
10.José Pequito - 0 laps
Winning Team - João Malveiro and his mechanic
The Serpent 960 of Cláudio Lopes in action on the newly resurfaced Sintra circuit
Ricardo Nogueira was the best Serpent driver after the heats posting 2nd the fastest time
Wet and Shiny - The final had to be cut short due to standing water on the new surface at Sintra
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