Supercup 08 - Race 11 # Spa, Belgium - SEAN WINS !!

Schedule Spa Francorchamps

Friday 05.09.2008 17:00 - 17:45 Uhr Free practice
Saturday 06.09.2008 12:25 - 13:10 Uhr Qualifying
Sunday 07.09.2008 11:45 - 12:20 Uhr Race

Located in the mountain scenery of the Belgian Ardennes, the racetrack in Spa-Franchorchamps is regarded as one of the last great challenges for a race driver nowadays. This fact got its reason in the thrilling combination of fast bends on the down- and uphill parts of the circuit.

Above all, in the motorsports world famous curves like 'Eau Rouge' und 'Blanchimont' are passages, which are adored by the drivers. At least this are the parts of the 6.973 kilometres long GP-Circuit, were wheat is separated from the chaff. After a break in 2006, the Porsche Mobil1 Supercup returns to Spa-Franchorchamps in 2007 again.

TV broadcasts - Spa Francorchamps 07.09.2008

Day Date Station Show Time Content Duration Period

So. 07.09 Motors TV N.N. 00:00 Uhr Highlights 10:00 min N.N.
So. 07.09 Premiere Porsche Supercup 11:35 Uhr 11. Rennen live 50:00 min 11.35 - 12.25 Uhr
So. 07.09 Eurosport 2 Porsche Supercup 11:45 Uhr 11. Rennen live 40:00 min 11.45 - 12.25
So. 07.09 Eurosport Motorsports Week 19:45 Uhr Highlights 05:00 min 19.45 - 20.00 Uhr


Record starter field in Spa

With a the record number of 31 starters the Porsche Mobil1 1 Supercup goes into it's 11th round of the championship in Spa. Andrea Boldrini, the reigning champion of the Italian Carrera Cup, together with his team mate Stefan Comandini competes in Belgium. Richard Williams substitutes injured Lucas Guerrero at jet stream.

Bets time on Friday - Sean Edwards

Light drizzle, a slipery race track and almost no grip characterized the free practice session of the penultimate round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup in Spa. Sean Edwards clinches best time in front of Jan Seyffarth and Jaap van Lagen. Championship leader Jeroen Bleekemolen on fifth rank, Damien Faulkner finished 13th.

'Grip? I didn't find any grip here", Jan Seyffarth answered the question about the track conditions. 'In the first minutes of the session, when the circuit was completely wet, it was ok, but later on it was a real glissade."

Sensitivity and caution in dealing with the 420 hp of the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup are in demand in the initial phase of the 45-minute practice session. Already after a few laps Silverstone winner Sean Edwards makes clear, that he is the one who is to beat under these circumstances. With a 2:48.863 minutes lap he clinches the best time. 'The first two laps have been quite well, track conditions and the car have been top", the Brit comments on his fastest lap in the early stage of the session. "However, after that the circuit was to dry for wet tyres and to wet for dry ones, and with that any change on the setup of the car didn't make sense. Now I hope for a good result tomorrow, too."

The penultimate free practice of the 2008 session was dominated by the rain specialists. Beside Konrad pilot Sean Edwards, his former team mate Jan Seyffarth proved to have a quite sensible right foot. The winner of the Zandvoort race in the German Carrera Cup, - which took place under similar conditions - finished second fastest with only 0.106 second behind the best time and after the session agrees with the Brit. 'In addition to the poor track condition I was really held up by another competitor although I made heavy use of my headlamp flasher. Without that I would have claimed best time today. I found a good line in the rain but somehow I also got the feeling, that the car will be quite well under dry conditions. So it doesn't bother me what conditions the the track will have tomorrow."

Despite he spun two times, DAMAC driver Japp van Lagen with a gap of 41/1000 of a second on Seyffarth brought his Porsche in on rank three. 'With almost brand new rain tyres my first laps where really good, but than the grip level went down dramatically. The tyres where gone, however, sliding around the circuit with the Porsche was good for fun but not for reasonable lap times."

Over a long time the session was kind of draggy, when in the last three minutes a little movement rose up in the field again. UPS Porsche Junior Marco Holzer with the Manthey-Carrera at his second race on the seven kilometres long Spa circuit improved on eighth position with a gap of 1.1 seconds to the fastest. In front of Holzer, Jà¶rg Hardt, championship leader Jeroen Bleekemolen, Chris Mamerow and the surprisingly strong guest starter Richard Williams are ranking on positions four to eight. With Stefan Rosina and last years winner Patrick Huisman the Top-10 completes.

The Qualifying for the 11th round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup takes place on Saturday, from 12.25pm to 13.10pm. The decision on the driver's title of the championship may fall in the Qualifying already. In case Damien Faulkner does not fetch the pole position, championship leader Jeroen Bleekemolen clinches the title already on Saturday.

René Rast with an advantage of 4/10 of a second clinches pole position fort he 11th round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup. Championship leader Bleekemolen will start beside the MRS-Pilot in the first row. Faulkner ranks only 11th. With that, Jetstream pilot Jeroen Bleekemolen unofficially is the 2008 Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup champion.

The qualifying for the eleventh round of the Porsche Mobil1 Supercup was all about Jeroen Bleekemolen from the Netherlands. By setting the second quickest time of the day, the Jetstream Motorsport PZ Essen pilot secured the coveted championship title before the season final. 'I've finally done it! What an incredible feeling to be champion. But we still can't really relax. I don't need the points any more but we'd still like to win the team title. 2008 was a great year and the finish was perfect. Unfortunately we weren't good for pole position today. René did a great job and was ultra fast. Maybe we can make up for it in the race. I'm not about to slacken my pace – my motto is full steam ahead."

Jeroen Bleekemolen is a man in a hurry. Already in the qualifying for the penultimate Supercup race in Spa-Francorchamps, Bleekemolen finally beat his opponents to win the trophy. Only Damien Faulkner (Ireland, SAS Lechner Racing) could have halted the Dutchman's charge. But Faulkner's last chance evaporated with eleventh in qualifying. With this, Bleekemolen is the second man from the Netherlands to pocket the title, after quadruple Supercup champion (1997 to 2000) Patrick Huisman. With the exception of Istanbul and Silverstone, Bleekemolen climbed the podium at every race over the course of the season. On his way to winning the championship he won in Monaco, Magny-Cours and Valencia. On top of this, the Dutchman netted second place four times and third position once at the wheel of his 911 GT3 Cup.

The 26-year-old dominated the qualifying for the eleventh round of the world's fastest international one-make series for quite some time. In the first ten minutes of the session five pilots swapped places at the top of the time sheets before Bleekemolen set the quickest lap time and kept it until twelve minutes before the end. Half a dozen pilots again launched an attack to turn the quickest lap.

Six minutes before the end of the session, youngster René Rast prevailed. The 21-year-old secured pole position with a time of 2:25.453 minutes, relegating the new champion Bleekemolen to second position on the grid by a narrow four-tenths of a second. 'This result is simply fantastic. It's a great feeling to set pole by more than three and a half tenths of a second. I had a lot of traffic with my first set of tyres and couldn't always drive as I wanted. With my second set we chose the perfect time to go out. I had a free lap and now I'm absolutely thrilled that it's finally worked again in the Supercup. I'm feeling confident that we'll bring home a good result from tomorrow's race", Rene Rast says.

Third on the grid went to Jaap van Lagen (Netherlands, Damac Kadach Racing Team). 'What an interesting qualifying. Early on the track was damp and it was drizzling. When it stopped the circuit dried up quickly. I had already tried my luck on the wet surface and couldn't get a good lap in with my second set of tyres. Still, we have a good starting position. Anything is possible from third on the grid in Spa", so the Dutchman.

He shares the second row for Sunday's race with Belgium's David Saelens (Irwin Racing), who takes up his home race from fourth. Sean Edwards (Great Britain) qualified his Konrad Motorsport 911 GT3 Cup on fifth place with his compatriot Danny Watts (SAS Lechner Racing) setting sixth. Positions seven and eight are occupied by Jiri Janak (Czech Republic, Konrad Motorsport) and Norbert Siedler (Austria, VELTINS MRS Racing). Ninth went to last year's Belgium winner and four-time champion Patrick Huisman (Netherlands, Irwin Racing). Jan Seyffarth (Germany), driving for tolimit Motorsport, completes the top ten.

Sean Wins !!! Awesome

Champion again, was it raining by any chance? Congrats Sean :thumb: :thumbs: :thumb:

1st lap was 'interesting' and cars were everywhere at the end of Le Combes, he is the rain master.

Franz Konrad made a great signing in the rain master Sean Edwards.


SAS Lechner of Watts and Faulkner had an awful coming together towards the end of the race, and both retired, the SAS team boss ain't going to be happy !

F

RACE QUOTES

Position 1, Sean Edwards, Konrad Motorsport

Position 2, Jaap van Lagen, DAMAC Kadach Racing

Position 5, Patrick Huisman, IRWIN Racing

Position 6, David Saelens, IRWIN Racing

Position 8, Jiri Janak, Konrad Motorsport


Race results Porsche Supercup Spa Francorchamps 07.09.2008
Pos. Car no. Driver / Competitor Laps Time Gap km/h Fastest lap

1 22 GBR Edwards, Sean Konrad Motorsport 11 29:10.422 + 0:00.000 157.751 2:29.068
2 25 NED van Lagen, Jaap DAMAC Kadach Racing 11 29:12.255 + 0:01.833 157.586 2:28.904
3 10 NED Bleekemolen, Jeroen Jetstream Motorsport 11 29:16.054 + 0:05.632 157.245 2:29.966
4 15 AUT Siedler, Norbert VELTINS MRS Racing 11 29:17.492 + 0:07.070 157.116 2:29.484
5 27 NED Huisman, Patrick IRWIN Racing 11 29:18.049 + 0:07.627 157.067 2:29.567
6 26 BEL Saelens, David IRWIN Racing 11 29:20.669 + 0:10.247 156.833 2:29.722
7 14 GER Rast, René VELTINS MRS Racing 11 29:24.706 + 0:14.284 156.474 2:29.158
8 23 CZE Janak, Jiri Konrad Motorsport 11 29:25.998 + 0:15.576 156.360 2:29.468
9 2 SVK Rosina, Stefan Lechner Racing Bahrain 11 29:27.093 + 0:16.671 156.263 2:29.762
10 3 GER Seyffarth, Jan tolimit 11 29:28.871 + 0:18.449 156.106 2:30.860
11 17 GER Hardt, Jà¶rg Schnabl Engineering 11 29:29.364 + 0:18.942 156.062 2:29.855
12 29 GER Holzer, Marco UPS Porsche Junior Team 11 29:29.889 + 0:19.467 156.016 2:30.167
13 1 ITA Zampedri, Alessandro Lechner Racing Bahrain 11 29:30.238 + 0:19.816 155.985 2:29.484
14 5 SUI Benz, Marc SPS automotive-performance 11 29:30.883 + 0:20.461 155.928 2:29.686
15 9 GBR Williams, Richard Jetstream Motorsport 11 29:32.341 + 0:21.919 155.800 2:30.083
16 33 USA Langhorne, William VELTINS MRS Racing 11 29:33.197 + 0:22.775 155.725 2:31.041
17 7 NED Bleekemolen, Sebastiaan Bleekemolen Race Planet 11 29:33.855 + 0:23.433 155.667 2:30.084
18 4 IRL Cregan, Robert tolimit 11 29:35.335 + 0:24.913 155.537 2:31.328
19 35 ITA Comandini, Stefano Centro Porsche Padova 11 29:43.147 + 0:32.725 154.856 2:30.385
20 16 HKG O'Young, Darryl Schnabl Engineering 11 29:49.717 + 0:39.295 154.287 2:31.238
21 12 NED Bleekemolen, Michael Racing Team Jetstream 11 29:58.452 + 0:48.030 153.538 2:31.373
22 19 NED van Splunteren, Paul HSF Porsche Eindhoven 11 30:02.076 + 0:51.654 153.229 2:30.515
23 18 NED Stielstra, Gosse HSF Porsche Eindhoven 11 30:25.064 + 1:14.642 151.299 2:34.170
24 11 POR Petiz, Pedro Racing Team Jetstream 11 31:02.229 + 1:51.807 148.280 2:30.456
25 20 IRL Faulkner, Damien SAS-Lechner Racing 10 27:14.687 + 1 Lap 153.563 2:30.220
26 21 GBR Watts, Danny SAS-Lechner Racing 9 24:10.951 + 2 Laps 155.708 2:29.638
27 8 NED Buijs, Tim Bleekemolen Race Planet 8 21:35.607 + 3 Laps 155.003 2:30.193
28 34 ITA Boldrini, Andrea Centro Porsche Padova 8 21:40.291 + 3 Laps 154.444 2:29.536
29 24 GER Mamerow, Chris DAMAC Kadach Racing 3 07:41.678 + 8 Laps 163.119 2:29.514
30 6 GER Arnold, Lance David SPS automotive-performance 3 07:41.882 + 8 Laps 163.047 2:29.584
28 AUT Ragginger, Martin UPS Porsche Junior Team 0 n/a. + n/a n/a n/a

He could put the wind up the rest of the grid by doing a rain dance at the end of the pit lane, first thing on a Sunday morning. :lol:

Edwards wins in Spa

Sean Edwards wins the Supercup glissade in Spa. With that the Konrad pilot after Silverstone clinches his second season victory on a damp track. Supercup champion Bleekemolen on rank three behind his compatriot Jaap van Lagen.


Sean Edwards and his engineer Kotitsas

With a good start the two first rows got into the race heading toward Eau Rouge, which became a very special place for Danny Watts. The Brit – being in trouble - with a very tough drift just managed to keep his Porsche on the track.

In the meanwhile the leading four René Rast, David Saelens, Jeroen Bleekemolen and Jaap van Lagen all together got in trouble in the braking zone approaching Les Combes. 'Nobody decided to draw back and so we all set our brake point to late and and ended up in trouble", René Rast commented on the situation. Saelens used the emergency exit, Bleekemolen went over the meadow and Rast some seconds later touched the barriers. 'I don't know exactly what happened, but suddenly I went off." The pole setter drops back to the end of the field, started a hunt back and with got points for seventh rank. 'My drive through the field was not bad", he finally found a reason to be satisfied. DAMAC Kadach pilot Jaap van Lagen takes over the lead with Bleekemolen and Saelens behind.

In the fourth lap it started to rain in the Ardennes. On the soap like turf van Lagen is able to lay a gap of about 2.5 seconds to his pursuers, making profit of Sean Edwards attacks on the Jeroen Bleekemolen. The Brit sets the new Supercup champion under pressure and takes over second position in lap six, and one lap later takes over the lead from van Lagen. 'I made a small mistake at the exit of Raidilion, but that was not the decisive situation. Sean (Edwards) was quick like hell, I never could have held him behind", Jaap van Lagen praises 'rain-man" Edwards. 'I couldn't fight for the victory today, because I damaged the front lip of my car when I went through the meadow. I had too much under steer", third ranking Jeroen Bleekemolen explained. 'I had a hard fight with the car to see the finish line. However, the most important thing is my title, but I am happy to finish on the podium, too", he says and escapes heading Zandvoort. 'I still have to compete in a race for the Renault Clio Cup. Unfortunately I have to start from the last row of the grid, because I missed the practice sessions", he leaves the visitors of the Porsche hospitality astonished.

Behind the leading pilots the hard life rages. Porsche Junior Martin Ragginger was out of the race already in the first lap. Chris Mamerow and Lance David Arnold crashed some laps later at the exit of the La Source corner and retired from the race like Ragginger. The action was delivered by the drivers on positions 4 to 13. One of the main actors of the 11 laps at Spa was MRS-pilot Norbert Siedler. With fourth rank the Porsche rookie claims his best result this season. 'Like yesterday in the qualifying, this day was quite good, too. Finishing fourth close behind the podium, is not bad especially under the changing track conditions. I am really satisfied", he shines. "The tests here in Spa have paid off."

The fourfold super cup champion Patrick Huisman finished fifth. 'Great result", says the man who had his so far last Supercup victory exactly 12 month ago at the same place. 'We will have a thrilling season final in Monza next weekend, because all of a sudden we have got a handful of drivers fighting for the runner up, including me." Behind the Dutchman David Sealens ranking fourth damaged his cooler in the last lap, but still was able to finish on sixth position. 'Someone lifted the throttle on the straight and I run into his car. It was an unfair action", the local hero growls to his home race. Jiri Janak and Stefan Rosina, who during the race improved 15 positions, finished eighth and ninth. Jan Seyffarth completes the top-10 in Spa.

The two SAS-Lechner pilots Danny Watts and Damien Faulkner played no decisive role in the race. Further more both crashed into each other and with that brought a possible title win in the team standings in danger. "If team mates crash, it's a nightmare for the team manager", Walter Lechner says. 'The collision between Damien and Danny was stupid and at least counterproductive for our title chances. Instead of defending our lead we now are in front of a thriller next weekend in Monza. I hope the two gentlemen are able to prove the can do it better."

With its second success on a damp track Konrad pilot Sean Edwards definitely becomes the "Rainman" of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup. "It was an unbelievable race, really terrific! The first lap was crazy: All of us have tried to brake as late as possible in Les Combes. I really had to take care not to damage my car. But it turned out all right and I then simply have tried to improve positions. When it started to rain, the setup of my car was brilliant. When I overtook Jeroen Bleekemolen on the outside, I had really good grip an could easily pass him. I didn't expect, that it would suffice also for Jaap van Lagen thought. But he made a mistake and I could do it the same way as I did with Jeroen. A great race, I hope we can repeat this performance in Monza again", the 21-years-old, who still has chances to claim the 2008 rookies title, says.

Already next weekend the Porsche Supercup has its season final in Monza. Both, the runner-up as well as the decision in the team standings will fall in Italy.

:worship: :worship: :worship: :worship: :thumb: :thumb:

happy days

Well done Sean !

Great news..

Any channel's showing your race later ?

Silverstone and now Spa. Think it is about time I let this boy show me how to drive.

Well done Sean - Will look forward to your view of the race 8)

I'm so proud of him! Great work matey, champion at work.

Jiff

Was watching live on telly, very nervy. Great drive! With rain on the track nobody else had a chance. Another convincing win and a great days viewing of motorsports.

Well done Sean!

ps next time you win, in the room just before the podium where number 2 & 3 are chatting right in front of the camera - go and join in and flash your sponsors arm patches! The bottle of Evian can wait for later 8)

congrats Sean!