EEC Australian GT Championship 2017 - Round 5 - Townsville

After a rather eventful Sydney round the 15 strong EEC grid lined up to take on the tight streets of Townsville, North Queensland. Despite the small gaps down the field the qualifying order hinted at a potentially very successful weekend for pilots of American made vehicles. Ethan Bass took pole just 0.09 ahead of EEC returnee Mike Bell. The Corkscrew duo of Sansano and Timpen looked very quick in their matching Ford GTs while Will Mazeo once again showed of the potential pace of the 991.
Qualifying Result
Pos Driver                   Vehicle                                           Laps Best lap           Gap
1 Ethan Bass               Dodge Viper SRT GT3-R                14 01:08.3414 -
2 Mike Bell                  SRT Viper GT3-R                            14 01:08.4350 00:00.0936
3 Cameron Sansano  Ford GT - GT3                                 13 01:08.7551 00:00.4137
4 Rob Timpen             Ford GT - GT3                                 15 01:08.9648 00:00.6234
5 Will Mazeo              Porsche 991 GT3 R                         13 01:09.2076 00:00.8662
6 Bob Cech                 Porsche 991 GT3 R                         14 01:09.3564 00:01.0150
7 Karl Dubois             Mercedes AMG - GT3                     16 01:09.4352 00:01.0938
8 Matthew Walther  McLaren 650S GT3                         12 01:09.6332 00:01.2918
9 Lukasz Pala              Bentley Continental - GT3            12 01:10.0254 00:01.6840
10 Sami Tihtonen      BMW M6 - GT3                               12 01:10.4235 00:02.0821
11 Marcelo Sampaio Audi R8 Ultra - GT3                        10 01:10.5986 00:02.2572
12 Jason Whited        Lamborghini Gallardo FL2 - GT3   8 01:10.8051   00:02.4637
13 Clement Verneau Porsche 991 GT3 R                          9 01:10.8149   00:02.4735
14 Paul DeClercq       Cadillac ATS-VR - GT3                      3 01:16.1026   00:07.7612
15 Chad Bartrum       Lamborghini Huracan - GT3           0 -                    -

The race got off less than cleanly almost mirroring the test race with Karl Dubois and Matthew Walther coming together on the mainstraight kink after the green flag dropped. The quattro of Bass, Bell, Sansano and Timpen began to develop a decent gap over the chasing Porsches of Mazeo and Cech.

As the field started to spread out mistakes started sneaking into the forefront. EEC debutant lost the rear end of his Lamborghini in turn 2, thankfull keeping out of harm's way. Matthew Walther cemented his place at the rear of the field after struggling for any real pace, hitting the wall at turn 6 coming in to repair a puncture. Meanwhile Sami Tihtonen in the sole BMW lost the rear end at the final hairpin and was forced to retire.

A mix of pitstop issues and a loss of concentration took the usually rapid Cameron Sansano out of outright contention finishing the race fighting Karl Dubois as he recovered from the lap 1 incident. Paul DeClercq, Chad Bartum and Marcelo Sampaio foight hard at the rear, attempting the catch the next battle pack up the road in the form of Clement Verneau and Lukasz Pala. Unfortunately Paul ran out of fuel on the second to last lap being the second retirement of the race.

Mike Bell was able to keep ahead and gradually strengthen his grip on the lead as the race went on. He finished the race with a healthy gap of 3 seconds back to the chasing Viper of Ethan Bass.
"I really enjoy racing with the EEC mod, so when my schedule fits I try and make the odd race here, and I really took to the Viper like a duck to water, and with abit of help from Ethan (circa 2009-2012 teammates on and off) I really found some pace, had abit of a compromised Qually session where I caught people at the wrong point, but that happens. In the race I took the lead and just drove within my limits to not make a mistake, and after Ethan's contact with the lapped car, everything just fell together. Looking forward to Adelaide and hoping for a repeat performance in the Smile Power Viper." - Mike Bell

Race Results
Pos  Driver                            Vehicle                                  Laps   Time/Retired  Best Lap    Laps Led
1 Mike Bell                    SRT Viper GT3-R                           40 47:10.8506 01:09.0308 35
2 Ethan Bass                 Dodge Viper SRT GT3-R               40 +00:03.9875 01:08.7163 5
3 Will Mazeo                Porsche 991 GT3 R                       40 +00:23.6555 01:09.3521 0
4 Bob Cech                   Porsche 991 GT3 R                       40 +00:43.5386 01:09.5131 0
5 Cameron Sansano    Ford GT - GT3                                39 +1 lap 01:09.1013 0
6 Rob Timpen               Ford GT - GT3                                39 +1 lap 01:09.4788 0
7 Karl Dubois                Mercedes AMG - GT3                   39 +1 lap 01:09.6292 0
8 Chad Bartrum           Lamborghini Huracan - GT3         39 +1 lap 01:11.1145 0
9 Clement Verneau     Porsche 991 GT3 R                        39 +1 lap 01:10.2217 0
10 Lukasz Pala             Bentley Continental - GT3            39 +1 lap 01:10.2770 0
11 Marcelo Sampaio  Audi R8 Ultra - GT3                        39 +1 lap 01:11.4947 0
12 Jason Whited        Lamborghini Gallardo FL2 - GT3   39 +1 lap 01:10.9536 0
13 Paul DeClercq        Cadillac ATS-VR - GT3                    38 Fuel   01:10.5908 0
14 Matthew Walther  McLaren 650S GT3                       37 +3 laps 01:10.8013 0
15 Sami Tihtonen        BMW M6 - GT3                             12   DNF        01:10.9172 0

Next round of the EEC Australian GT Championship is on the extremely fast streets at the Adelaide, but next weekend at EEC we are racing at NOLA Motorsport Park for the EEC GT2 Challenge