LFS Beginner's Cup Round 2 Race Report
Written by Joseph Ellis, 17 August '08
As the red lights went out at the Fern Bay Club circuit, the race to turn one had begun. All cars managed to make a suprisingly clean start, and contact was minimal. After going wide on the exit of the first corner, Chris Ford lost places to both Pawel Iskra and Michael Bingham.
Going into lap 3, Yann Laprevotte moved up into second place after a mistake by Darryn Lobb. Travis D'Souza was now also right on Lobb's tail, hunting him down and looking for a chance to overtake, despite having a car weighed down with 18kg of ballast. Inevitably, Disaster struck for Dan Zanetti, as a troublesome internet connection ended his race.
As the fifth minute of the race approached, it was Novak, Laprevotte, and Lobb occupying first, second and third postions, respectively. James Wishart, down in 10th place, was now over half a lap behind, with little chance of gaining a position. His second crash of the race was a crash too many, hitting the curb at the wrong angle had sent his car onto it's side. This signalled the first Safety Car deployment of the race. After two laps under the Safety Car, the race resumed on Lap 9.
Chris Ford soon spun, after clipping the grass at the side of the track, this allowed Nikolai Ott and Michael Klenke to gain a place, moving up into 7th and 8th positions. At the front of the grid, Laprevotte had his eyes on 1st place, and wasn't going to let Novak get away from him. As the 11th lap dawned, Laprevotte took Novak through the inside of turn one. Darryn Lobb soon followed him, overtaking Novak to gain 2nd position. Further back in the field, there was a scrap for 6th involving Ott and Bingham. However, it was rather short-lived, as Ott locked up and went wide in the entry to T1 on Lap 14. This allowed all 3 cars behind him to gain position.
It wasn't looking good for Ott, and matters worsened as he rode the curb on Lap 20 and rolled it. The Safety Car was brought out for the second time. The green flag was soon shown, and the race restarted with 7 laps remaining.
The cars occupying the podium positions were very close. At this point, any one of them could have gone on to win. Entering the final lap, Bingham and D' Souza were fighting for fifth. D' Souza, with the heavier car managed to hold Bingham off, keeping his 5th place. It was Laprevotte in first, with Lobb second and Novak third.
