Solaris Motorsport heads to Imola aiming for the first podium with the Aston Martin Vantage GT3
Pescara, Italy – This weekend the Italian GT Championship resumes with the second round of the season, with two races scheduled on Imola’s historical Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari. After the debut in Monza, where the Solaris Motorsport Aston Martin showed a great potential and came really close to the podium in Race 1, the track on the Santerno river should favour the characteristics of the Italian Vantage GT3. The Italian GT series will field a record-breaking grid, with 41 cars expected on track.
“Imola, with its ups and downs and lots of turns, fits better our Aston Martin than the straights of Monza. – said Francesco Sini, driver – In the last test session we found new setup solutions and I think they could give us a big step forward here where the chassis can make the difference. I like Imola, when I was in Superstars on the wet with my Camaro I was able to challenge the AWD cars and last year we were very competitive with the Corvette and only bad luck took a good position away from us. This year we start from a better condition and we want to take what we lost 12 months ago.”
The race of the Italian GT Championship comes a short time after the Italian round of the GT3 Le Mans Cup, raced exactly in Imola, which saw another Aston Martin win the race. “We worked closely with our Aston brothers of TF Sport in the last weeks and we are very happy about their win. Obviously this is great news for us and makes us very confident, we have the chance to concretize the high potential we saw in Monza.” commented Max Mugelli, winner of the 2006 Aston Martin Racing Cup. “Imola is an old school track, it is very demanding for the cars and mostly for the brakes, but I know very well the track and I like it. Our Vantage has a good pace in race conditions, it is delicate with the tires and this can be an advantage at the end of the race. But we need to improve the qualifying, where probably we aren’t on top yet. On tracks like this, where it is very hard find the way to overtake, having a good position on the grid becomes very important. But I’m confident for the race because I know the team is working in the best way e and my team mate Francesco is a very fast guy. I feel good: we have everything to fight the top positions!”
“Everything was new for us in Monza, there were a lot of things to fix and we discovered an Italian GT Championship with a very high level of competition. Despite that, we showed great performances but we could not concretize our potential.” declared Roberto Sini, Solaris Motorsport Team Principal. “Now we know better the car and its secrets, we had a good test session and both Max and Francesco have now more confidence with the Vantage. The win of our Aston Martin brothers from TF Sport makes us more confident but, in the meantime, gives us also more responsibility, we must find the way to concretize the potential we know we have.”
The second rount of the Italian GT Championship from Imola will start on Friday, May 27th with the two session of free practice, scheduled at 10:35 AM and 2:30 PM. On Saturday morning the green light for the two qualifying sessions, one for each race, will turn on at 8:55 AM and 9:15 AM. Race 1 will start at 3 PM on Saturday, May 28th, while Race 2 is scheduled for Sunday, May 29st, at 12:40 AM. Both the races will be live streamed on the official website of the Italian GT Championship (www.acisportitalia.it/CIGT).
For further information you can visit the web site www.solarismotorsport.com or send an email to media [at] solarismotorsport.com
Follow the Solaris Motorsport’s Aston Martin on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram!