AF Corse on the podium in Race-2 at the Hungaroring

The final act of the Blancpain GT World Challenge held at the Hungaroring circuit, saw the titles awarded for the Pro, Pro-Am and Am classes, the latter having already been clinched by Wolfgang Triller and Florian Scholze handling the Ferrari 488 GT3 courtesy of HB Racing.

First lap to forget. Any title aspirations in Pro-Am class that the Rinaldi Racing crew might have harboured, soon dissipated on the first lap when David Perel crashed out of the race and into a barrier on curve 8 after contact suffered in frenetic phase. The 488 GT3 of AF Corse, manned by Andrea Bertolini and Louis Machiels, who after their third place finish in Race-1 were mathematically out of the running, saw their chances of battling for the race victory jeopardized when the Italian driver was hit by the Frederic Vervisch’s Audi, sustaining a left rear puncture. The entry of the Safety Car, necessitated to remove Perel’s machine, allowed Bertolini to return to the back of a newly compact group. When the race restarted the Italian attempted a comeback similar to the one staged in Race-1 and stayed out on track as long as possible, until 28 minutes from the end, before swapping over with his team-mate. When the chequered flag dropped the Italo-Belgian duo finished in third position in Pro-Am class, while in Am class, HB Racing’s 488 GT3 driven by the champions Florian Scholze and Wolfgang Triller crossed the finish-line in twenty-fifth overall position.

Standings. The Blancpain GT World Challenge Europe season dedicated to sprint races thus concludes with Rinat Salikhov and David Perel second overall while the pairing Andrea Bertolini and Louis Machiels watched third place on the leader board fade away by a mere half point.