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Italian GT Sprint Championship, Round 3

Simone Iacone and Sascha Tempesta raced one of VSR’s Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evos at Imola this weekend, in round two of the Italian GT Sprint Championship. Racing in the Am class the Italian duo finished second in class in both races.

Iacone took the car out for the first qualifying session and with a monster lap earned himself a place on the second row and the honour of being the fastest Lamborghini driver. He held third at the start before becoming embroiled in a battle with the Ferraris of Schirò and Zampieri. By lap five Zampieri had fallen back and was soon passed by Frassineti. As the leaders started to lap the GT4 cars Iacone handled the traffic better than Schirò and pulled out a two second gap. On lap thirteen the pit window opened and Di Amato and Agostini dived straight in from the lead of the race leaving Iacone out front in the VSR Lamborghini, closely followed by Schirò. On lap sixteen Iacone pitted and Tempesta took over the car. He valiantly battled with the faster Pro drivers as they worked their way to the front and as the race entered the final ten minutes was holding the Am lead and lying eighth overall. A Safety Car in the final five minutes froze the order and allowed the field to bunch up again. Racing resumed with two laps left but now Tempesta had the second and third placed Am cars right behind him. Fumanelli made the most of his experience and at the restart passed both Tempesta and Zanotti for the Am lead just before a Full Course Yellow slowed the cars down for the run to the chequered flag.

The qualifying time for Sunday’s race was set by Tempesta who lined up on row eight. He moved up to fifteenth overall, fourth in class, during his stint which ended on lap twelve when the pit window opened and Iacone took over the car. Five laps later the pit window closed and Iacone was running in fourteenth and was one of the fastest men on track. On lap twenty Iacone passed Mann to take third in class. Two laps later he passed Cuhadaroglu for second and set about chasing the class leading Honda, eight seconds further up the road with Zampieri, Perolini and Greco separating them. The race finished under Full Course Yellow forcing Iacone to content himself with tenth overall and second in Am.

The Sprint Championship concludes next month with a double header finale at Mugello.