The Prancing Horse sprints to the final battle of the Guia weekend. Harmony Racing completes this year's FIA GT World Cup
News & Announcements Macau S.A.R. Macau Guia Circuit 11-18 11:41
On November 17, the 71st Macau Grand Prix entered the final day of competition. In the 16-lap race of the FIA GT World Cup, the two Prancing Horse cars of Harmony Racing tried their best to chase forward and improve their rankings in the face of wet conditions. Ye Yifei drove the No. 50 car and finally won the 11th place, and Daniel Serra drove the No. 51 car to get the 14th place.
On Sunday morning, the weather conditions changed again, and heavy rain swept the Macau Guia Circuit. Although the Grand Prix once announced the postponement of the race schedule. However, after the FIA weighed the pros and cons, the 16-lap race of the GT World Cup was scheduled to be held on Sunday afternoon when the rain was lighter.
At 12:10 noon, the race officially started under the leadership of the safety car. The No. 50 and No. 51 cars of Harmony Racing started from the 13th and 16th positions respectively. After 5 laps, the race waved the green flag and started. As there was still water on the track surface, the two drivers maintained a stable driving state and gradually entered the regular race rhythm.
Ye Yifei drove the No. 50 car steadily and continued to chase the Mercedes-AMG car in front of him. However, the slippery track and the characteristics of the Guia Circuit that are easy to defend and difficult to attack made it difficult for Ye Yifei to charge forward. However, as the leading group of cars fought and both ran off the track, the No. 50 car successfully improved its ranking and finally crossed the finish line in 11th place.
Daniel Serra was sandwiched between two Porsche cars in the race. The three cars started a fierce battle that lasted for many laps, but the experienced Brazilian veteran did not lose his position in this fight and kept a certain distance from his opponent. When the checkered flag waved, Daniel Serra finally finished this Macau Grand Prix in 14th place!
Harmony Racing completed the 71st Macau Grand Prix---FIA GT World Cup. Various accidents during the weekend prevented the Prancing Horses from performing at their best, but the two drivers and all the members of the Harmony team sprinted forward with their best efforts, demonstrating the Harmony spirit of never giving up! We look forward to returning to the Guia Circuit in Macau next year and competing in the FIA GT World Cup again!
Overall, I am very satisfied with my performance this weekend. It rained heavily at the beginning of the race on Sunday. As the track gradually dried, I felt that my overall rhythm was good, but due to the bad weather and track conditions, and the compact midfield group, I didn't have much to do.
I think this weekend has exceeded my expectations, especially the good performance on the first time I drove on the Guia Circuit in the rain. Later, due to various reasons such as red flags and traffic conditions in qualifying, we were unable to maximize our potential and failed to run a higher qualifying position. So the final result was not particularly ideal, but I think I had a very good speed throughout the weekend, did not cause any damage to the car, and also accumulated very valuable experience. I look forward to the opportunity to return to this competition next year!
Starting from the back is destined to be a difficult race. As I said before, I think our race is more focused on collecting more data and observing the performance of the car in the wet. I think we had a car that could fight for the victory today. Unfortunately, various conditions in qualifying forced us to start from the back, which made us lose the possibility of fighting for the championship. Of course, we can use this to further improve our competitiveness for next year's race. That's it. I brought the car back intact and now we will turn our attention to next year's event.
We were in high spirits from Thursday practice. From the first free practice session in the rain to the second free practice session in semi-dry and wet conditions, we performed very strongly, so we really went into Friday's qualifying with very, very strong confidence.
But from Friday qualifying, the god of luck chose someone else. The multiple red flags in qualifying prevented us from making good results with the first set of tires, including when changing to the second set of tires, when our drivers were constantly breaking their fastest personal times in the stage, there was a major accident on the field, and then we lost the opportunity and could only qualify at the back. From then on, we were basically restricted by the characteristics of the Macau track, and it was difficult to overtake. The two drivers in 12th and 16th places had no way to catch up. Although there are some variables in the Sunday race due to the rain, we are also too far back. We can see that the other Ferrari car on the field is performing very strongly, and our lap time is also fast enough. It is only because of this starting position that we regret that we did not get a particularly good return in this year's Macau Grand Prix. Especially seeing the strong performance of another Ferrari in the Sunday race, we feel that we can also do a similar performance, of course, the premise is to start from the front.
Everything will happen in the race. Today, the No. 83 car briefly overtook the first place, and after two turns, it encountered a collision with the car behind at the Lisboa bend. This is the race, this is Macau, and we all need to be mentally expected and prepared when we come here. Therefore, the only thing we can say is that we can't give up, we must work hard and persevere, and come back next year.
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Translated by 51GT3 X-lingual AI.