Pre-Season Event 2 - Australia (Adelaide)
ACE SERIES Qualifying Race Report Finishing Order Fastest Laps Driver Comments Download Mixed Logfile Action Replays Semi-Pro Results
	1996/97 Pole Position:  1:07.230 (Oliver Roberts) 1996/97 Race Time:  1h37m38.963 (Oliver Roberts) Race Distance:  81 laps

Qualifying

Race

In lap 24, Jan on 4th and Martin on 7th were the first to make a stop. The third to do so was Oliver, but not for a new set of tyres only. He suffered from a broken rear wing after he had an accident with one of the Minardis. This threw the current champion back to the end of the field for one lap. However, his race was to end a few laps later when a stationary car on the track caused his retirement.

By lap 29, everybody made his first stop, except of Markus, who was on a one-stop strategy. He was second until he made his stop, but Jan was coming closer. The battle for 4th wasn't less exciting either: Martin and Axel Bruns were within 2 seconds for nearly ten laps. Unfortunately, Martin went into trouble later and wasn't able to finish his race due to technical problems.

After all drivers on a two-stop strategy made their last stop between laps 53 and 58, the exciting moments were to find at the back of the field. While the first four positions were held by Janak, Kruggel, Svehlik and Bruns until the end of the race, James Luscombe, Nuno Maltez and Mirko Patzenbein provided entertainment on positions five to seven. James held 5th place until lap 65, but during the next 8 laps he swapped it with Nuno frequently. When Nuno had an accident in lap 74, James could enjoy his 5th place until the end, while the necessary pit stop put Nuno back on 7th, half a minute behind Mirko.

A small demonstration of the new points system: Martin made 53 laps (65.43%) until he was out, his score would be 0.6543 * 143 = 93.57 = 94 points (BTW, I'll always round *up*!) Oliver completed 36 laps (44.44%) and would get 0.4444 * 139 = 61.77 = 62 points for his race.

Race Statistics

What the drivers said about the race

Markus Kruggel (Wild 13), 2nd:
"Not too bad. I opted for a one-stop strategy and it seemed to work well enough for the first try here, I had a 16 second lead over the following group of CCs when I came into the pits. My stop also marked the start of the better half of my race. During the first 40 laps I had not less than 6 yellow flag incidents, and mostly a CC was in front of me, braking early as expected although nothing dangerous was on the track anymore. After my stop, I went faster than expected."

Jan Svehlik (Bolgani), 3rd:
"The first half part of the race was boring for me. I haved many cars to lap. The race was tough for me and for the other cars. The race finished only 9 cars."

Axel Bruns (Wild 13), 4th:
"A close race. Starting from second, I managed to pass Villeneuve before the first turn, but he re-took the lead on the back straight, and hung on to it until lap ten, when I passed him again, and he continued to follow me closely after that. After my first pitstop, I therefore found myself in third, about twenty seconds behind the leader. Fortunes changed on my outlap, however, after first Michael Schumacher, running in second, crashed out, and then Villeneuve ran into a damaged car and had to pit prematurely, handing me back the lead. After my second and his first pit stop, Villeneuve turned up the heat, chasing my thirty-second lead, and together with my two offs in the last two laps, which cost me about 15 seconds, he finished only 11 seconds behind me."

James Luscombe (V-Tec F1), 5th:
"Lost the front wing after coming out of the first corner (I'm sure you can get round it in 5th, but I have yet to manage it) of lap 57. So I came into the pits at the end of that lap, wasn't too bad as I was due for a tyre change anyway. Had lost a place but got it back after a few laps."

Mirko Patzenbein (Enigma Racing), 6th:
"My first successful race !!!"

Nuno Maltez (Maverick), 7th:
"I just hate that first chicane!!!!"

Oliver Roberts (Digitech), 9th:
"A bit of a disaster really... things went from bad to worse. Compared to last season's race I was off the pace, even though I decided to use the same setup and strategy. My lap times were pretty erratic, mainly because I didn't handle the backmarkers very well."

Action Replays

• Axel Bruns (Wild 13):
  "Accidents were the order of the day in a race that saw only half the field finish, and there were a number of times when I had to find my way through damaged and crashed cars on the track; on one such incident, I was lucky not to end my race when around a corner a stationary Stewart appeared suddenly."

• Michal Janak (Digitech):
  "There wasn't something interesting on this race. Only little slalom between two cars (Panis and Katayama) which you can see on my replay."

• Markus Kruggel (Wild 13):
  "A nice overtaking of two CCs at the hairpin. The funny thing was that one of them (Nakano) pushed me into the right direction after I ran a bit wide at the exit of the chicane. Sometimes they can be really nice to you :-)"

• Mirko Patzenbein (Enigma Racing):
  "Mirko sent a cool replay where a yellow flag indicated trouble, but where was it? Mirko found out very quickly when the CC that he chased pulled out and revealed the view on a stationary Eddie Irvine. Mirko was able to steer to the car onto the grass and past Irvine woithout crashing or damaging something."

• Oliver Roberts (Digitech):
  "Finally, on lap 37 there was a yellow flag incident on the first chicane. At first glance I thought the accident had been cleared so I didn't bother to slow down much, but I didn't realize that the slow moving car I saw in the distance was actually stationary (unsighted by Villeneuve). I slammed on the brakes, but there wasn't much I could do about it... End of race."

• Jan Svehlik (Bolgani):
  "There was one nice scene in my race. A car crashed before me and I have nearly crashed with it."

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