After losing Race 1 at the line on
Saturday (21) at Buriram, GruppeM Racing had its No. 999
Mercedes AMG GT3 on the top step of the podium in excellent
form, benefited by crashes of its main rivals early in the race, in
what was the best Blancpain GT Series Asia weekend for
Maximilian Buhk and Hunter Abbott.
As the cars crossed the main straight
to start the race the No. 7 Absolute Audi kept the lead while
things got pretty tight for the No. 999 GruppeM Mercedes in second
place. Things got even tighter for other three cars in the first lap,
as Race 1 Am Cup winner No. 19 KCMG Audi as the car spun after
a contact with the No. 88 CRAFT-Bamboo Porsche on Turn 2, and some
turns later, a high speed carnage sent out the No. 18 KCMG Audi, the
No. 37 BBT Ferrari and Race 1 winner No. 38 Spirit of Race Ferrari,
bringing the first yellow flag of Race 2.
The race was back to green after ten
minutes but first and second places were quite consolidated, even
though the GruppeM car suffered some early pressure from the No.
39 Spirit of Race Ferrari. A bit behind, Aditya Patel was
struggling with keeping the race-winning No. 86 OD Racing Audi
between the white lines and went down to sixth.
In the pit stops positions remained the
same as the No. 7 was with Jeffrey Lee in place of Alessio Picariello
and the No. 999 had Hunter Abbott in place of Maximilian Buhk, and
just two laps were needed to Abbott simply go past Lee, opening the
gap immediately as Lee's times were significantly slower, and this
also opened the opportunity for Jiang Xin in the No. 39 Spirit of
Race Ferrari to get his way into second place, but a block into turn
3 unsettled the front end of the car, making Jiang lose time and
almost ending his race.
Jeffrey Lee's early defense into Jiang
Xin proved to turn out against him, as Jiang took a few moves to
pass Lee for second place, powering his Ferrari after Turn 1, as
Marchy Lee in the No. 5 Audi Hong Kong car took third
place and Mitch Gilbert took fourth place with the No. 86 OD
Racing Audi. Marchy, Jiang and Gilbert were soon in a three-way
battle for second place, with the No. 5 keeping second place while an
unsuccessful attempt of overtake by the No. 39 saw the No. 86 take
third place in the final lap to not lose it anymore. With hell
breaking loose for second place, Hunter Abbott had just to carry the
No. 999 to the finish line as the winner as the gap was way too
comfortable to have any threats.
With most of the Am Cup opponents left
behind due to crashes, the No. 69 CMRT Eurasia Aston Martin
had the class honors with James Cai and Kenneth Lim as drivers, while
the No. 77 CRAFT-BAMBOO Porsche took a dominant GT4 class win
after a penalty in Race 1.
Now all attentions turn out to Japan as
the series starts its trip there with the Suzuka Circuit on
June 24th and 25th.
PHOTO: Blancpain GT Asia
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