| Donington, August 8, 2003 Hayanari Shimoda and Andy Wallace continued to show their newly formed partnership is working well by taking pole position at Donington Park for the 5th Round of the FIA Sportscar Championship. Early pace was set by Justin Keen in the Taurus Sports Racing Lola BK2/10B showing the potential of the car in the hands of Ian Dawson’s Norfolk based team. His place on the top of the pile was soon swept away however by a flying Shimoda in the DBA4A – Zytek who clocked 1:24,632 after 10 minutes of the session despite a 360 degree spin in the process of pushing hard. Championship leader Jan Lammers, his car carrying maximum ballast weight of 65kgs could do nothing to match the pace of the RN car and finished the session 4th overall with time of 1:26,285, behind the other Racing for Holland Dome S101 on 1:25,847 and a resurgent Keen who having slipped down the order launched himself into 2nd spot with 1:25.731. Fairing less well were Pescarolo Sport who could only manage 5th on the grid, whilst Lupberger in the Ascari struggled with understeer and traction problems throughout the session ending 6th. Amanda Stretton in her first FIA Sportscar Championship race could manage only 10th on the grid but is coming to grips with the Lola BK2/10 rapidly. “I’m very happy with my pole position,” said 19 year old Shimoda “this is my first pole in car racing and I’ve only been here once before. The car is fantastic, very fast and comfortable” SR2 qualifying saw battle resumed between super-fast Sam Hignett and Mirco Savoldi Hignett once again set a blistering pace within the first five minutes with 1:29,821. Recently the trend has been for Hignett to set a benchmark time and for Mirco Savoldi in the works Lucchini to catch and pass the Jota Pilbeam Nissan in the dying seconds but this time it was not to be and Savoldi had to settle for 2nd in SR2 with a 1:30,399. Millard and Flux in the Rapier 6 had an inspired battle with an on form Gianni Collini in the GP Racing Lucchini Alfa, both finished with 4 tenths of each other on 1:31, 529 and 1:31,905 respectively. |