Engen Racing Team Press Release
The Engen Racing Team finished the 2013
season by claiming their second national title of the season at Kyalami on
Saturday. Michael Stephen (A1 – Engen Xtreme) claimed the Bridgestone
Production Car Championship title at the final round, making it his third
consecutive title in this series.
With three races on the day, Stephen claimed
the victory in the second race – but not without his share of drama on the day.
“We had good pace from the practice, qualifying left me with a freak experience where the brake pressure switch
disintegrated and lost brakes in qualifying so had to start from the back. In
race one I touched the back of Hennie and put a hole in my radiator. I
circulated and finished to get some points,” says Stephen. “For race two I must
thank Tschops who chose to swop cars with me, wrapped up the championship
there.”
“In that third race I dropped back a bit as
Tschops' car is set up a bit differently to mine, but I managed to work my way
through to finish in second – and that second place felt like a win.”
The gesture from Tschops allowed his
teammate, Stephen, to win the title for a third time while effectively taking
him out of contention for the final event. Sipuka still kept the team's second
Audi S4 Quattro circulating to finish both the second and third races of the
event.
For Kosie Weyers (5 – Engen Primax) the final
event of the season was a low-pressure affair as he had already claimed the
title in the Engen Volkswagen Cup series. This victory took place at the
penultimate round of the series, at his home circuit in Cape Town.
The final round saw the Engen Volkswagen Cup
champion race to second overall on the day.
“I had a good outing today, starting with
qualifying on pole this morning. Flat-spotting my left-front tyre during race
one cost me time, but I managed to close on Mark towards the end, and take
second place,” says Weyers. “Engen prepared a phenomenal car for me this year.
We won nine races of the 18 total and the weakest finish this whole year was a
fifth place which is very good.”
The victory marks Weyers' first national
circuit-racing championship title, also providing the Engen Racing Team with
two victories for the year – one for each of the national motorsport series in
which they compete.
For Mandla Mdakane (18) the final round of
the season proved a bit of a mixed event. Good pace in the early sessions
didn't see a good performance during qualifying, but he did improve on his
position during the racing, finishing the day in eighth position overall for
the day.
“Today went quite well,” says Mdakane.
“Things were good in the practise but there was a problem in qualifying and I
couldn't put in a good lap with a red flag coming out. I got up to twelfth in
the first race and got up to 10th for
race two. In all it was a pretty good day, even though the new brake discs took
some getting used too, they are very sensitive and it was easy to lock up the
wheels – I even flat-spotted a tyre in the first race.”
