D'Station Racing looking to restore their championship position as ALMS races into the night

Friday, February 14, 2020

The build up for tomorrows four hour penultimate round of the 2019/20 Asian Le Mans Series has been steadily progressing for the Japanese D'Station Racing AMR team in their #777 Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3 as all the teams dealt with the changing weather systems over the circuit today.

Having won the opening round of the Series in Shanghai last year, the last round at the Bend Motorsport Park in Australia last month proved to be a bruising affair for the team after Tomonobu Fujii was unceremoniously dispatched off the circuit and into the garage for lengthy repairs by an impatient LMP2 driver. Despite the endeavours of the teams super fast silver driver Ross Gunn and was as steady stint from gentleman driver Satoshi Hoshino, The Bend left the squad with just eight points for their efforts and that dropped them down into P2 in GT with the final two races in quick succession to each other this weekend and next.

Yesterdays private testing was warm yet dry around the 5.5km Sepang circuit with the team delivering steady lap times in the two available sessions - not the fastest as that position was again held by one of the many Ferrari 488's despite their now slightly heavier Balance of Performance for the round.

Today became 'interesting' during the two Free Practice sessions as torrential rain affected both sessions as the twenty three cars first circulated in the light of a wet day before seeing out the second session under floodlight just as the race will allow them to do tomorrow after Qualifying in the morning.

Next weekends replacement for Gunn has also made the trip over to Malaysia to meet the team and introduce himself into their ways of working. Due to the back to back nature of the closing half of the Asian Le Mans Series and the restructuring of the World Endurance Championship following the cancellation of its proposed Brazilian round earlier this year, next weekend sees a clash between the two ACO sanctioned events that forces Gunn to see out his WEC duties and miss the final round of the ALMS from Buriram in Thailand.

The dilemma has been resolved with the placement of Tom Gamble by the AMR factory who will race with the team next week in the place of Gunn, an opportunity that the 2018 Autosport Young Driver of the Year winner was clearly looking forward to despite his limited running in the new AMR Vantage GT3.

Having raced in an Audi R8 in the Blancpain GT Series last year and in a TF Sport prepared AMR Vantage GT3 at last years Aston Martin Festival from Le Mans, Gamble is certainly no newcomer to GT racing and depending how this weekend race goes, Buriram could be a winner takes all event that could pave a way directly to Le Mans next year for the team.

The start of the four hours of Sepang starts at 08:30 GMT