It was heartbreak for Abu Dhabi Racing by Black Falcon at the Yas Marina Grand Prix circuit last night after they lost a race that was for the majority part of the day their’s to win.
The defending Gulf 12 Hours champions arguably did not have the best of starts to their 2014 campaign, but the trio led by Khaled Al Qubaisi with Jeroen Bleekemolen and Bernd Schneider sharing driving duties had to settle for second place, behind the 3 AF Corse of Steve Wyatt, Michele Rugolo and Davide Rigon in a Ferrari 458 GT3.
As was the case in the first half of the race in the morning, Bleekemolen gave the Abu Dhabi outfit the lead when the second half resumed after a three-hour service break.
Bleekemolen steadily increased the lead over his McLaren and Ferrari rivals over the course of nearly two hours, handing the wheel of his Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 to Schneider with a sizeable advantage.
And Schneider did not disappoint; at one point the lead to the Ferrari of 3 AF Corse had been stretched to over two minutes, the German driving faultlessly to keep Black Falcon ahead and in with a chance of defending the title they first won last year on debut.
Emirati Al Qubaisi then took over and ensured that the lead his team-mates had built remained intact.
But with little over an hour remaining, it appears a pit stop might have gone wrong.
AF Corse’s Rugolo shot into the lead; the McLaren 650S GT3 of Alvaro Parente and the SLS AMG of Abdulaziz Al Faisal also sailed past the Black Falcon, relegating the Abu Dhabi outfit to fourth.
Schneider was again at the wheel and displaying a determination to catch up, the German put pedal to metal to try and claw back the losses that had accumulated to nearly a minute to the leader.
The German drove with intent and climbed up to second spot behind the Ferrari of Rugolo and was seven seconds behind the leader with 25sec remaining.
It was too steep a hill to climb, yet Schneider eventually cut the deficit down to 3.058sec; too late though, the title had been lost.
Parente gave McLaren the final podium place on their debut in the race.
Al Qubaisi said: “We did our very best, the race was very close; the Ferrari was really very fast. They have more speed than us but we tried our best.”
Asked if he was disappointed with the result, the Abu Dhabi native said: “Well of course, we came to win. But we try again, Dubai is next month [the 24 Hours of Dubai] and hopefully there we can make it up.”
On whether he was content with second place, Al Qubaisi said: “It’s OK, but when you come to be first then… its not as good as when you are first.”
Asked what might have gone wrong, the Black Falcon driver insisted: “They were faster, everything was OK. We had a clean race, they had a clean race and the strategy was fine; just that they were faster. We now focus on Dubai 24 Hours.”
Schneider, who took the last stint before the finish, said: “I got some vibrations in the end and I had to take care of the tyres. I could protect P2 but the Ferraris were faster and I could do no more.”
And team-mate Bleekemolen was philosophical in his assessment of the result, saying: “For sure today they were faster than us. It is a pity we could not defend our title, but then you can’t win them all. We now look forward to the Dubai event.”
