From 25-27 August the Porsche Carrera Cup Asia 2023 season returned to Malaysia’s Sepang International Circuit for the second time this year. Added to this, the weekend’s racing festivities were leveraged with the launch of new 911 GT3 RS in Malaysia.
As the lights extinguished, Latorre yet again had trouble making a smooth getaway out of the grid, with van der Drift slipping into p1 almost immediately. Things swiftly went from bad-to-worse for the points-leader, as Latorre clashed with his season rival TORO Racing’s Luo Kailuo on turn one, with their clash continuing on to turn 2 with both drivers ending up in the gravel. With contact between both cars, Latorre drop down to p16 and Luo Kailuo drop down to p11. This left space for van der Drift to begin opening up his lead. With local hero Sime Darby Racing Team’s Nazim Azman just behind him, and his old rival Porsche Holding’s Martin Ragginger in p3, van der Drift maintained his focus and developed a steady 5-second lead. Latorre and Luo Kailuo spent their race catching up, with each driver managing an impressive number of overtakes throughout the race – however not enough to reach the podium. The race ended with van der Drift over the line first, seven seconds ahead of Ragginger in p2, with Azman coming in p3 and claiming his first Carrera Cup Asia podium finish.
Once again the race started with Latorre in pole in round 10, and once again the point-leader had a bad start out of the gate, immediately losing first place to Chris van der Drift who had started in second. Luo Kailuo started in third, and kept his place out of the grid, instantly applying pressure to Latorre ahead of him. Ragginger had started the race in p4, and became the fourth member of the quartet out in front. The four drivers kept up the pressure on each other throughout the whole race, finishing most laps within 1.5 seconds of each other. The race was yellow-flagged and the safety car came out on lap 12, which took us through to the final wave of the flag. Latorre finished in second, Luo Kailuo finished in third, and van der Drift came in first, making this his third race win of the season. Having had a slow start to the season, the three-time Carrera Cup Asia champion has now found his footing, and van der Drift now sits in second-place in the championship standings for the first time this season.
Zhou Bihuang led the Pro-Am pack in Round 10 from p6, with Team C&D’s Hong Shijie starting a few spots behind him in p10. Meanwhile, Pro-Am points-leader Bao Jinlong had one of his worst starting positions of the season, beginning the race dead last in p20 owing to an issue during qualifying. By the end of lap 1, Zhou Bihuang had clung on to his p6 position, and had been joined by Hong Shijie in p7 and Trans-China Automotive Racing’s Francis Tjia in p9. Bao Jinlong wasted no time in starting his comeback, and managed an astonishing seven overtakes on the first lap to put him in p13 by the start of lap 2. Bao Jinlong continued his comeback run, and had made it all the way up to p8 by the race’s halfway point, having overtaken Hong Shijie to sit directly behind Zhou Bihuang, who still had a comfortable 5 seconds of space behind him. Bao Jinlong chipped away at Zhou Bihuang’s lead until the safety car came out and settled everyone into their final positions. The race ended with Zhou Bihuang in first, Bao Jinlong in second and Hong Shijie in third.
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