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A1GP: Series News & Notes
Written by: SPEED Staff
SPEEDtv.com   
03/02/2009
London, UK
 
Marco Andretti and the Team USA A1GP effort have had a rather anonymous presence in the series this season. Time is running out to salvage a positive result. (A1GP.com) ยป More Photos
 With A1GP World Cup of Motorsport heading onto the home straight as regards Season Four attention is now switching to the next race, the championship standings and the first race of Season Five.

The sixth event of the season, A1GP Algarve, Portugal, on 10-12 April is at a brand new venue for the series and one of the most eagerly awaited on the calendar by the series in general and A1 Team Portugal in particular. A1GP is not the only series to have been to the impressive Autodromo International Algarve for testing as Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro driver, Felipe Massa, was there in his Formula 1 car in December. The Brazilian visited A1GP Gauteng, as he was in South Africa for a sponsor event, and spent time with A1 Team Portugal where he joined Filipe Albuquerque in a photo shoot to help publicize the Algarve event.

One driver who will certainly be looking forward to this event is A1 Team Pakistan’s seat holder, Adam Khan, as this will be his Season Four debut. The 23-year-old has been dealing with the frustration of watching his fellow competitors race while his car was readied for him. His first chance to drive it came at South Africa’s Phakisa Freeway Circuit in Welkom the week of the Kyalami race. On the Tuesday and Wednesday he completed nearly 150 laps of the 4.24 km circuit and his comments were: “It’s been a long wait for me to have a car which I could safely and comfortably fit, but it’s been worth it. I really enjoyed the handling of this new A1GP Powered by Ferrari car. It was a really smooth running test and, with the excellent reliability we had, we were able to quickly move onto developing our performance.

“Unfortunately we’re
a long way behind the other teams now, as they have completed five race weekends and that’s given them plenty of time to understand the complexity of the car, its handling characteristics and set-up development. We elected not to contest the South African round, but we’ll be racing again at the next round in Portugal.”

In the championship standings Switzerland has gone to the top of the points’ list for the first time this season. It is, in fact, the fourth team to do this as France and Malaysia left Zandvoort tying for the lead, Malaysia left Chengdu on its own at the top, Ireland took over and left both Sepang and Taupo in the coveted position, and now it’s the turn of the current World Cup holder. However, no doubt all those at the top of the standings will now start getting their calculators out as they will all be able to drop their worst score, and this could throw up some different scenarios. The current points’ situation has Switzerland leading Ireland by three points, but they have to watch out for the dark horse, A1 Team Portugal, who is just a further six points behind.

Now looking even further ahead to Season Five, the first confirmed event of the season will be the eagerly awaited street race on the Gold Coast, which has now been officially called the SuperGP by combining the name of the two main racing events on the programme, A1GP and V8Supercars. While A1GP will turn five next season, Queensland will be celebrating its 150th birthday. No one in A1GP is prouder of what is happening in his own backyard on the 23-25 October than A1 Team Australia seat holder, Alan Jones, who attended the recent launch of the new title.

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