Home Formula 4F4 South East Asia F4 round-up: Sulaiman and Enders win Mexican GP support races, Ghiretti takes five from six in Thailand

F4 round-up: Sulaiman and Enders win Mexican GP support races, Ghiretti takes five from six in Thailand

by Ida Wood

The 2018-19 NACAM F4 season started at Mexico City on the undercard of the Mexican Grand Prix, and resulted in two different winners.

Scuderia Martiga EG returnee Kory Enders took pole for the first race, and was favourite for victory having won the last three races of the 2017-18 season. The American wasn’t quite so lucky though, ending up a distant fourth as British F4 regular Manuel Sulaiman took his first car racing win for Ram Racing. Telcel RPL Racing’s Pablo Perez de Lara finished second, 4.347 seconds behind, with Noel Leon continuing on from his 2017-18 podium cameo in third.

In race two events favoured Enders far more, and he took victory by a dominant 8.138s over Sulaiman, who leaves Mexico City with a six point championship lead. Enders’ fellow American and team-mate Jak Crawford was just behind in third, ahead of Leon and Perez de Lara. His RPL team-mate Mateo Llarena also did well, taking an eighth and a seventh.

Alessandro Ghiretti took five wins out of six at Buriram, extending his Formula 4 South East Asia with two rounds to go.

The Frenchman headed Kane Shepherd in the first four races, each between the range of three to six seconds. Muizz Musyaffa, the third of the three title contenders, completed the podium on three of the encounters with Antoine Potty doing so in race two.

The penultimate race of the weekend was Ghiretti’s most dominant, putting 7.950s between himself and Musyaffa, who failed to finish race two after colliding with a stalled car and causing the race to be red flagged. It took just a few corners in the fifth race for Ghiretti to take the lead, while two grassy moments meant Shepherd ended a distant sixth, with Musyaffa and Alister Yoong finishing second and third.

Shepherd struck back in the final race of the weekend, triumphing in an on-off battle with Yoong. The closest they got was when Yoong attempted a move at Turn 3 and ended up making contact with the leader. Both survived and Shepherd took his fifth career win by 1.948s. Musyaffa finished third with fastest lap, ahead of Ghiretti and Potty.

Home hero Sandy Stuvik, 2010 Asian Formula Renault and 2014 Euroformula Open champion, was also on track but only finished once.

 

Results round-up [pole in bold, fastest lap in italics]
NACAM
Race 1 (12 laps) Race 2 (12 laps)
1 Manuel Sulaiman 22m37.135s
2 Pablo Perez de Lara +4.347s
3 Noel Leon +7.494s
4 Kory Enders +7.895s
5 Jak Crawford +8.882s
1 Enders 22m38.320s
2 Sulaiman +8.138s
3 Crawford +8.404s
4 Leon +10.138s
5 Perez de Lara +15.624s
Standings?1 Sulaiman 43? ?2 Enders 37? ?3 Perez de Lara 28? ?4 Leon 27? ?5 Crawford 25
South East Asia
Race 1 (15 laps) Race 2 (12 laps) Race 3 (15 laps)
1 Alessandro Ghiretti 26m06.991s
2 Kane Shepherd +3.225s
3 Muizz Musyaffa +3.546s
4 Antoine Potty +6.493s
5 Alister Yoong +25.800s
1 Ghiretti 20m58.821s
2 Shepherd +3.207s
3 Potty +12.348s
4 Yoong +22.764s
5 Luke Thompson +54.012s
1 Ghiretti 26m09.657s
2 Shepherd +3.885s
3 Musyaffa +10.856s
4 Potty +11.257s
5 Yoong +18.750s
Race 4 (15 laps) Race 5 (15 laps) Race 6 (15 laps)
1 Ghiretti 26m08.643s
2 Shepherd +5.666s
3 Musyaffa +8.713s
4 Potty +16.074s
5 Thompson +33.564s
1 Ghiretti 26m16.147s
2 Musyaffa +7.950s
3 Yoong +8.874s
4 Potty +9.649s
5 Ryo Komikado +20.620s
1 Shepherd 26m11.646s
2 Yoong +1.948s
3 Musyaffa +4.158s
4 Ghiretti +5.812s
5 Potty +17.728s
Standings?1 Ghiretti 375? ?2 Shepherd 329? ?3 Musyaffa 238? ?4 Potty 176? ?5 Thompson 168