Alex Fontana wins wet second race at Ningbo
Kia’s Alex Fontana won the second dace of the weekend at the Ningbo International Speedpark, finishing ahead of the Volkswagen of Rob Huff and the BAIC Senova of Dan Lloyd, the latter both driving through from 11th and 12th on the reversed grid.
The first lap took place behind the safety car due to the rain, with standing water all around the track where it’s been raining constantly for the last 24 hours.
Fontana held the lead at the start in his Kia K3, while Rainey He remained second in his Changan FRD Ford Focus, while team-mate Andy Yan dropped a spot to Jason Zhang’s Kia.
On the first green flag lap there were retirements for Chen Xu in the Haima M6, after a coming together with Jim Ka To’s Kia, while Juan Carlos Zhu’s BAIC Senova stopped on circuit at Turn 16 and required time to be recovered.
Zhang overtook Rainey’s Ford to put his Kia up to second, while Huff was making fast progress in the SAIC VW333 Racing Volkswagen and was up to fifth at the end of lap three.
On lap five, Jiang Tengyi was the next casualty of the race, with the Volkswagen driver aquaplaning off on the main straight and smashing into the barriers at Turn 1, with his Lamando GTS left stranded at the corner for a number of laps.
Huff passed Rainey He’s Ford for fourth at Turn 11 on lap six, before overtaking former champion Andy Yan’s Ford Focus at the hairpin at Turn 15 a lap later to claim third.
On lap eight, a decisive defence by Jason Zhang to keep second from Huff didn’t pay off, with the Briton diving down the inside at the Turn 6 hairpin to take second, but with Alex Fontana now having built a four second lead, was unable to close the gap.
Dan Lloyd continued to work his way forward in the BAIC Senova, and overtook both Yan and Zhang with two laps to go to claim third, scoring key points for Senova in the manufacturers’ championship.
With the top two in the championship David Zhu and Jiang Tengyi not scoring, Martin Cao moves up to second in the drivers’ standings, four points behind Zhu heading to the next race of the championship at Wuhan.
