Alex Carella and Shaun Torrente overcame two yellow flag situations, but fell short of claiming a fourth successive UIM F1 H2O World Championship title for the Qatar Team in yesterday’s punishing 15th Grand Prix of Sharjah on Khaled Lagoon.

The duo reached the chequered flag in second and third positions, but Frenchman Philippe Chiappe led from the start to the finish of the 37-lap race to confirm a first ever World Championship title for the CTIC China Team. Qatar’s consolation was the Team, Fast Lap Trophy and Pole Position Championship titles.

 “It was a disappointing day but we cannot win this title every year,” reflected Khalid bin Arhama al-Kuwari, head of formula racing at the Qatar Marine Sports Federation (QMSF).

“It was a tough race. Philippe was very fast and we were not able to close him down. Shaun did well to get back from fifth to third, but it was not to be. Now we will go away for the winter break, assess everything and come back stronger and more determined to win back the title in 2015.”

 

Grand Prix of Sharjah

The start to the main race was critical and Carella knew that he had to make a move on Chiappe after the run out to the first turn buoy and prevent the Frenchman benefiting from clear water ahead. Torrente lined up in fifth behind the leading duo, Jonas Andersson and Sami Selio for the 37-lap race.

Chiappe made a clean start and edged clear of Carella through the first lap, as Torrente passed Selio to take fourth behind Andersson. Chiappe’s lead was 3.88sec after five laps, but Carella and Torrente were not able to improve on their second and fourth places through lap seven.

Torrente began to apply the pressure on third-placed Andersson as the race progressed, but a yellow flag was raised soon afterwards when Filip Roms pulled up on the racecourse with technical issues. Racing restarted on lap 14 and Torrente managed to pass Andersson and slot in behind Chiappe and Carella.

But Kuwait’s Yousef al-Rubayan flipped his boat on lap 15 and forced a second yellow flag situation while his stricken hull was removed from the course.

Chiappe, Carella and Torrente were bunched up and the restart was critical, but the Frenchman maintained his lead into lap 21 and began to pull away from the Qatar Team duo. His lead was 6.44sec after 25 laps and the Frenchman extended that to 8.22sec into lap 32.

Neither Carella nor Torrente had an answer over the closing laps and Chiappe passed the chequered flag to seal his second win of the season and confirm a maiden World Championship title on his 92nd career GP start in his 12th year of Grand Prix racing.

Torrente and Carella had used Friday morning’s second free practice session to get the best set-up for the race and practice their starts. Torrente did run a few hot laps and posted the third quickest lap of 46.51sec behind the Team Abu Dhabi duo of al-Hameli and al-Qamzi.

 

Second F-4S race

Qatar’s Khalid Abdullah al-Kuwari and Mohammed al-Obaidly qualified in pole position and seventh for the final F-4S Trophy race of the season, but the Qatar Team duo were not able to finish the season with a second win and al-Kuwari shadowed Briney Rigby, Bingchen Wu and Mike Szymura to the chequered flag to take fourth position.

Khalid Abdullah al-Kuwari was in superb form for the second day running and the winner of Thursday’s race was fastest in second practice and claimed pole position for the final race of the season with a best lap of 56.66sec in the time trials. That was sufficient to beat Briney Rigby by 0.11sec and claim the start advantage for the 20-minute race. Al-Obaidly qualified in seventh after Thursday’s accident.

Al-Kuwari was not able to repeat the success of the previous day and the Qatari reached the chequered flag in fourth position behind Rigby, Bincheng Wu and new champion Mike Szymura.

Grand Prix of Sharjah – race result

1. Philippe Chiappe (China CTIC)

2. Alex Carella (Qatar Team)     +6.55sec

3. Shaun Torrente (Qatar Team)                     +13.41sec

4. Sami Selio (Mad-Croc Baba)  +15.66sec

5. Francesco Cantando (Motorglass)           L1

6. Jesper Forss (Team Sweden)                       L2

7. Duarte Benavente (GC Atlantic)                 L2

8. Xiong Ziwei (China CTIC)         L2

8. Bartek Marszalek (Motorglass)                  L2

10. Erik Stark (Team Nautica)    L10

 

Final standings (top ten)

1. Philippe Chiappe (China CTIC)                     70 pts

2. Alex Carella (Qatar Team)     62 pts

3. Shaun Torrente (Qatar Team)                     56 pts

4. Sami Selio (Mad-Croc Baba)  33 pts

5. Francesco Cantando (Motorglass)           28 pts

6. Erik Stark (Team Nautica)      23 pts

7. Duarte Benavente (F1 GC Atlantic)           16 pts

7. Bartek Marszalek (Motorglass)                  16 pts

9. Ahmed al-Hameli (Team Abu Dhabi)      14 pts

9. Thani al-Qamzi (Team Abu Dhabi)           14 pts

 

2014 F-4S Trophy standings (top three)

1. Mike Szymura (F1 GC Atlantic)                     146 pts

2. Briney Rigby (Team Sweden)                       126 pts

3. Khalid Abdullah al-Kuwari (Qatar Team)                    77 pts

 

 

 

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