The duo formed by Gustavo Moura and Luís Cidade, in the Hyundai Elantra N TCR, was the winner of the first race of the third day of SuperCars Endurance Series, which ended this Saturday night, at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve, in Portimão, with an advantage of more than 5 seconds over the British Edward Moore and Marmaduke Hall, in the Ginetta G55 GT4 of Tockwith Motorsport.
The history of the race was marked by the accident, fortunately without physical consequences, that Gabriela Correia had, shortly after replacing her father, José Correia, at the wheel of the JC Group Racing Team’s Mercedes AMG. The young driver from Braga crashed hard at turn 4, and the race was interrupted. Until then, and when there was still 20 minutes to go, the British duo was in the lead, with the Hyundai in second place, and the McLaren 570s of SMC Motorsport, driven by Guillermo Aso and Gonzalo de Andrés, second in the PRO category, was third, while Daniel Teixeira (CUPRA Leon TCR), in fourth place, was second in the TCR category.
The outcome of the race began to take shape when, after a pause to remove from the track the crashed Mercedes AMG, a new starting grid was ordered, based on the classification recorded at the time of the interruption, for another 14 minutes of race. Gustavo Moura was the quickest, conquering the lead, which he would keep until the end, when there was no more natural light to keep the stipulated time. At the start, Moura still took a small ‘touch’ without consequences, but the most damaged was Daniel Teixeira, who, after a ‘move over’ by the McLaren of SMC Motorsport, got irreparable damage in the right rear wheel of his CUPRA, being forced to pull over.
The Chilean Nicolas Pino, in GJG’s Porsche 981 Cayman, and Pedro Silva (Audi RS3 LMS TCR) made good use of that second start to climb several positions, while Francisco Gonçalves (Lotus Exige) didn’t hide his happiness (“I had an advantage of 30 seconds, but both the safety car and the red flag made me lose that, and then I had to fight hard until the end? In the second position finished the Paulo Sousa/Jemma Moore duo, who used an older Ginetta G50, after the first car had its engine “broken” during tests. “Even so, with a rather outdated car, we managed to get a good result, which made us satisfied,” said the Portuguese driver from Tockwith Motorsport
RACE 1
1st, Luís Cidade/Gustavo Moura (P&B Racing, Hyundai Elantra N TCR), 5 laps
2nd, Marmaduke Hall/Edward Moore (Tockwith Motorsport, Ginetta G55 GT4/GT4 Pro), +5.201
3rd, Jorge Silva/Pedro Silva (Veloso Motorsport, Audi RS3 LMS TCR), + 10.167
4, José Carvalhosa/Nicolas Pino (GJG, Porsche Cayman GT4/GT4 Pro), + 11.094
5º, Francisco Gonçalves (#888 Motorsport, Lotus Exige/GTC), + 23.451
6º, Paulo Sousa/Jemma Moore (Tockwith Motorsport, Ginetta G50/GTC), + 24.615
7th, Andrius Zemaitis (ProGT, Porsche Cayman GT4/GT4 Bronze), + 35.028
8th, Guillermo Aso/Gonzalo de Andrés (SMC Motorsport, McLaren 570s GT4/GT4 Pro), + 43.299
9th, Pierre Arraou (Milan Compéticion, Audi R8 GT4/GT4 Bronze), + 54.139
10th, Daniel Teixeira (JT59 Racing Team, CUPRA León TCR), 3 laps behind
