Results of the 2006 A1 China Grand Prix
The final race of the inargural A1 season at Shanghai's fancy new circuit produced two first time winners and settled the final placement in the 2006 series behind champions France who had wrapped up the series in the previous race.
Malaysia's former F1 driver Alex Yoong took the chequered flag in the sprint race ahead of Britain's new driver Darrell Manning and Mexico's promising young Salvadore Duran. Yoong lead from pole position leaving France's Alexander Premat to pressure Team Britain, however he simply wasn't on form and soon found himself slipping down the order to eventually finish seventh.
Ireland finished fourth, driving strongly throughout the race, followed by a surprise fifth for Team Indonesia who were competitive all afternoon and finished ahead of the Czech Republic who eventually celebrated a successful weekend all-round
The Sprint race was not without its incidents, including a clash between Canada and front-runners Team Switzerland, ending their races. Austria's race ended on lap 5 and Jos Verstappen, in the distinctive orange car of Team Netherlands, suffered mechanical failure on lap 12.
In the featured race, A1 saw another new country claim a victory, an unlikely one from the Czech team. Tomas Enge drove a commanding race to finish six seconds ahead of Alex Yoong who again did Malaysia proud and helped them leap frog up the final points table. He also picked up a bonus point for the fastest lap.
Enge snatched the lead early on and held on to it. Despite an trouble-free start Team Ireland flipped within a lap trying to overtake the Indonesia car, prompting a safety car and flurry of pit stops. A number of penalties saw the order change considerably leaving Team Britain as losers while Australia, New Zealand and, surprisingly, Pakistan settled into an order that was maintained at the finish
Team France had another poor finish but their A1 Champion driver Alexander Premat deserves credit for fighting his way up to sixth from last after a pit stop lasting nearly two minutes. Canada, Mexico, Italy and the USA picked up the remainder of the points. Meanwhile Brazil and Switzerland both retired, costing the former fifth on the final standings, while the Swiss luckily already had their second place in the championship sewn up.
The first A1 season now draws to a close and resumes in October 2006. Team France dominated the season finishing 51 points ahead of nearest rivals Switzerland who had 121 points. Team Britain (97) maintained their competitiveness throughout the season to finish third while New Zealand (77) consistently racked up the points for fourth ahead of the late emergence of Malaysia (74). Early contenders Brazil faded to fifth (71), pipping Team Netherland’s experienced by sometimes reckless Jos Verstappan (69) and the Irish (68). Portugal and Canada made up the rest of the top 10, while only three teams failed to score points, India, Lebanon and Russia.
A1 sprint race results from Shanghai
- Malaysia Alex Yoong 28.17.807
- Great Britain Darren Manning 28.27.648
- Mexico Salvador Duran 28.28.224
- Ireland Michael Devaney 28.31.712
- Indonesia Ananda Mikola 28.36.978
- Czech Republic Tomas Enge 28.38.622
- France Alexandre Premat 28.43.148
- New Zealand Matt Halliday 28.43.546
- Australia Ryan Briscoe 28.44.477
- Brazil Christian Fittipaldi 28.52.550
A1 feature race results from Shanghai
- Czech Republic Tomas Enge 59.23.250
- Malaysia Alex Yoong 59.29.971 +6.721
- Australia Ryan Briscoe 59.33.103 +9.853
- New Zealand Matt Halliday 59.49.716 +26.466
- Pakistan Adam Khan 59.51.433 +28.183
- France Nicolas Lapierre 59.54.682 +31.432
- Canada Patrick Carpentier 59.56.707 +33.457
- Mexico Salvador Duran 59.57.665 +34.415
- Italy Enrico Toccacelo 1.00.11.625 +48.375
- USA Phil Giebler 1.00.14.581 +51.331