Ferrari Monza race report

Fourth place for the Ferrari of Gattuso-Zampieri-Rigon under a Monza deluge

#71 Kessel Racing Ferrari 458 Italia: Stefano Gattuso, Daniel Zampieri, Davide Rigon

Photo by: Ed Fahey

Maranello, 15 April – The flag has just fallen on a largely rainy Monza three-hour race, the first round of the 2012 Blancpain Endurance Series 2012.

Among the Ferrari entrants, the best result went to the Kessel Racing-run 458 GT3 in the hands of Stefano Gattuso, Daniel Zampieri and Ferrari’s own Davide Rigon, who finished in fourth place overall. The race featured long periods behind the safety car because of bad weather, cancelling out the advantage of starting from pole position for the Italian team.

Eugenio Amos-Giacomo Petrobelli-Alessandro Bonacini dominated the Pro Am Cup, taking class victory in the Ferrari of Vita4One Italia.

Kessel Racing’s spoils also included the excellent performance of Valentino Rossi and Alessio Salucci. They took the chequered flag in 18th place overall even though contact with a slower car in the first corner affected their set-up for the rest of the race.

As for the AF Corse cars, the excellent performance of Gaetano Ardagna, Giuseppe Cirò and Daniel Brown stood out, though it was unfortunately thwarted by a gearbox problem that caused their retirement just 50 seconds from the flag. The 458 GT3 of Niek Hommerson, Louis Machiels and Andrea Bertolini did make it to the finish in 8th place among the Pro Am cars. The Ferrari driven by Jack Gerber and Marco Cioci finished in 22nd place in the class, followed by the sister car of Howard Blanck-Yannick Mallegol-Jean Marc Bachelier, 27th in the Pro Am class at the flag.

The next round of the Blancpain Endurance Series is scheduled for the weekend of June 2 at Silverstone