T&T lit up the South Dakota Raceway in Guyana during the qualifying round of the final leg of the 2018 Caribbean Motor Racing Championship (CMRC). The event titled “Ignite” lived up to its name on that part.
Most notable were Marc Gill in Gp2 and Kristian Boodoosingh in Grp3. Gill secured pole position by the end of Gp2 qualifying, posting a time of 38.271 seconds, just a tenth off Guyana’s Shan Seejattan (38.376).
Gill said, “it [the car] feels good; maybe a little low on power compared to the other guys up here but still did pole so not bad!”. He went on to say “The track was a little bit slippery but after a few laps I kinda got the hang of things and put the car on the correct line and drove a smooth lap.”
While Gill only has to finish the first race to secure the Caribbean Championship title for that group, he plans to keep it simple. The other T&T GP2 competitor Haymant Singh will start 9th after suffering from engine issues all day. Haymant hopes to have that sorted out for racing on Sunday.
Next to light up the show was Kristian “BoodooStig” Boodoosingh in the Spartan Civic showed its true colours as a beast to be contended with.
Kristian snagged pole from fellow countryman Ronald Wortman by 1.2 seconds after a 35.665 second lap time.
Wortman himself has been a tour-de-force in his orange Shell sponsored Civic, CMRC after CMRC. So we’re sure to see some good battles tomorrow.
Kristian was quite confident, saying “In the Spartan Civic I think we set the Gp3 lap record today so we’re going out there to rack up some wins. The plan is to get out front early, get a clean start and just knock out lap times.”
Kristian is also competing in the new Radical Caribbean SR3 Cup, however things were not so good for him in class; he starts 8th.
“The only issue I have is that I’m jumping from car to car and I didn’t get much track time so when I went out on new tyres it was kind of a shock.” Boodoosingh admitted.
Ahead of Boodoosingh in 7th place on the SR3 Cup grid is T&T’s teenage sensation Isa Dean, who contended “overall, we were playing with the handling, playing with a few adjustments on the car. The track conditions were bad cause it was dirty and we had to try different lines and try different strategies so it was trial and error today.”
The other T&T Radical driver Luke Bhola didn’t have the day he wanted either, but was still satisfied with the progress he’s been making.
Bhola, who started touring with his Radical only this year, will start 9th. “Guyana is not a strange place; it’s my second time here. The SR3 is a different car and it’s my third race actually so I’m just trying to figure out set up and get in that seat time; my times don’t look so bad from the fastest time so it’s just to get grooved in,” he said.
In Gp4, the most anticipated Audi TT of Faizool Madan unfortunately didn’t make it to qualifying with electrical issues forcing him off the line.
“Today we were having a wonderful day but then we got a blown fuse on the fan relay. Actually, we figured that we were using the wrong amps on the car and causing the fuse to blow. However, we got it sorted out and tomorrow we will have a wonderful race. The Audi will be flying tomorrow.”
Racing action gets going from 08:00
