A nightmare race 1 for Algarve Pro Racing in Abu Dhabi

If Algarve Pro Racing arrived in Abu Dhabi at the lead of the Asian Le Mans Series championship with a small one point lead over DKR Engineering, the Portuguese team led by Samatha and Stewart Cox will start the final of the championship in fourth place with a handicap of 13 lengths on the Luxembourg team and 1 point on the two teams ahead. 

However, all hopes remain for John Falb, Kyffin Simpson and James Allen in Algarve Pro Racing, who already have three Asian Le Mans Series titles in the bag. There is a title to look forward to this afternoon, but also an invitation to the 2023 Le Mans 24 Hours in the LMP2 class. 

Stewart Cox thought the sky was falling in Race 1. While a top three finish was possible, fourth place was the reward for the #25 trio who finished finally ninth in LMP2 after a post-race penalty. 

“The way the Asian Le Mans Series Abu Dhabi played out was unfortunate”, said Stewart Cox after the race. “We ran the opening stint with John Falb perfectly, but the race began to unravel when he came into the pits and selected neutral. Our data engineers didn’t spot that it was in neutral, and when James got in the car, he shifted to first. It went into first on the dash but not mechanically, and when the engine started and went to the limiter, it went to neutral. He then pulled first while a high RPM gearbox internals, and damaged the dog ring. He managed to do a couple of laps before it failed going into turn 5, which meant the car had no first gear. When he boxed for the next driver change, Kyffin had to start the car in second gear. The issue was, I thought he would pull away slowly because he was in second, so I lifted the lollipop earlier but he got a brilliant launch and crossed the line four tenths too soon, which forced us to do another 1m40 stop at the end of the race.”

The last few minutes were complicated for Kyffin Simpson, who was driving at the time. The driver from Barbados was alone on the entrance to the pit straight when he was fighting with Inter Europol Competition. A rookie mistake? Not really...

"During Kyffin’s stint, we started developing a problem with second gear engagement and the spin at the final corner was a consequence of that”, said Cox. “Kyffin pulled second, the gear didn’t engage ad he spun around into the wall, and having no first or second gear made getting the car moving again much harder. It’s a nightmare because we would have gained points on our main championship rivals if we had finished fourth, but we’re still in with a shot and will be going all-out in the final race.”