EXPAT Wanganui driver Earl Bamber has retained his Porsche Carrera Cup Asia crown after a near-faultless pole-to-flag drive during the second to last round at the Sportscar Champions Festival in Shanghai.
The 24-year-old defending champion crossed the line at the weekend just over a second ahead of PICC Team StarChase driver Alexandre Imperatori.
Imperatori had kept Bamber in his sights throughout the 12-lap race, but could not take him.
Third went to Team Porsche Holding’s Martin Ragginger, who had one last remaining chance to earn enough points to lift the title from Bamber, which came to nothing when the New Zealand superstar collected his seventh Asia Cup victory of the season.
“Alex didn’t make it easy for me in the race, but all season we knew it would be difficult as we’d missed a race in Zhuhai,” said Bamber.
“It’s a fantastic result for the team, and the competition has been great all season. Some of the best racing the Porsche Carrera Cup Asia has seen.”
At the start, Bamber got away well with Imperatori in hot pursuit, while Team Jebsen’s Rodolfo Avila had a look on the inside of Ragginger but backed off when there was no room to make the move.
Behind the leaders, the battle heated up between Zheng Tong Auto’s Zhang Da Sheng and Team Yongda Dongfang’s Ro C Skyangel from Singapore.
Having got by Zhang, Skyangel moved to pressure Avila but found the furious Chinese driver coming back at him and was forced to put all efforts into defending as the two made contact.
They would both trade passing manoeuvres before Skyangel finally emerged with some breathing space with two laps to run.
Guest driver Carlo Van Dam, who had been running in eighth, began to drop back, with Nexus Racing’s Alif Hamdan and then Budweiser Team Absolute Racing’s Tung Ho-Pin getting by him.
But all of this was behind Bamber, who drove on for the checkered flag, with Ragginger gracious in defeat and quick to congratulate his rival.
“I didn’t get such a good start today. I was following Earl and Alex for the first couple of laps but I couldn’t stay with them.”
Back in Wanganui, benefactor Lyndsay Tait was again glued to his computer watching the local boy win another big one.
“It was interesting that the commentators spoke very highly of Earl as a person and the professional way in which he deals with the media and his race team,” said Tait.
“There was also considerable speculation from the commentators as to what Earl might be doing next year but they said he was ‘tight-lipped’ about plans for next year and was just concentrating on the weekend’s racing.
“The standard answer of a true professional.”
Bamber will now try to make it two from two as he enters the double-header final round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup on November 1-2.
He leads the series with 123 points, five points ahead of Poland’s Kuba Giermaziak.
