SIZZLING PODIUM FINISH AT SILVERSTONE!
SILVERSTONE, JULY 11 2010 – Patrick Huisman has scored his second podium finish of the 2010 Mobil 1 Porsche Supercup at Silverstone this weekend. After having dramatically changed the set-up of his Tudor branded Porsche 911 GT3 on Friday night, the Konrad Motorsport driver showed a promising pace in Saturday’s qualifying session before setting a stunning race performance on Sunday morning. During the 11 lap race Huisman charged his way from seventh on the grid to third at the finish. By scoring 16 points, Huisman has moved up one position (P6) in the current championship standings. FREE PRACTICE AND QUALIFYING
Like in the previous round of the 2010 Mobil 1 Porsche Supercup at Valencia a fortnight ago, Huisman experienced some trouble with the set-up of his car in Friday’s free practice session. As the session was simply too short to make any real changes, Huisman used the 45 minute session to get into a good rhythm at the recently renewed 5.900 kilometer long track without paying too much attention to his lap times. After Huisman had finished the session in seventh position, he and the team made the call to completely change the set-up of his car overnight. It soon emerged to be the right decision.
In Saturday’s qualifying session, Huisman immediately felt the alterations improved the handling of his car. With the Formula One rubber (with its high grip level) still on the track, Huisman and his colleagues only had one proper chance to set their fastest time, which was in their first flying lap. As he had to rediscover the behaviour of his car and adapt his driving style to it at the same time, Huisman started his flying lap a bit conservative but set two blistering fast sector times in the final part of his ‘flyer’ in order to set the seventh fastest lap time, handing him a fourth row starting position for Sunday’s sixth race of the season.
RACE
Boosted by the improvements to his challenger, Huisman got off to a good start on Sunday morning as he immediately passed Stefan Rosina and Kuba Giermaziak in the opening lap of the 12 lap race. After a brief fight with Jaap van Lagen, the former four-time champion also overtook his fellow countryman in lap four. On from that moment, Huisman rapidly closed in on Norbert Siedler (P3) in the closing stages of the race and finally overtook the Austrian driver in the penultimate lap. By finishing the race in third position, the Dutch ace scored his second podium finish of the season so far. In the championship standings, Huisman now holds the sixth position.
PATRICK HUISMAN: “I’m really happy with our result today. After Friday’s free practice session, we completely changed our direction in terms of car set-up overnight. In Saturday’s qualifying session I immediately felt the changes were for the better, but wasn’t able to maximize our potential in that one lap. Today was simply awesome. The car felt very good and so were our lap times. The guys at Konrad Motorsport did a great job this weekend. Last but not least, congratulations to my team mate Nick Tandy for having deservingly won his home race!”
RESULTS ROUND SIX 2010 MOBIL 1 PORSCHE SUPERCUP – SILVERSTONE, JULY 11 2010
01. Nick Tandy (GBR), Konrad Motorsport, 12 laps, 25:36.352
02. René Rast (GER), Al Faisal Lechner Racing, + 05.572s
03. Patrick Huisman (NED), Konrad Motorsport, + 08.648s