Disappointing East London outing for Bonafede
DAINFERN- Last weekend promised much but failed to deliver for Dainfern's Audi Sasol racing team driver, Gennaro Bonafede during the East London race weekend.
Bonafede had good results in the pre-race where testing indicated that he would be competitive around the fast 3.921 km circuit.
He managed to win fourth place in the qualifying session, just six tenths of a second off pole position.
While most of the qualifying session running was done with temperatures around the 30 degree mark, race day dawned windy and cold.
Temperatures had not warmed up much by the time the first race got underway at 12.30pm.
Contact between a number of cars through the first couple of corners finally culminated in Bonafede leaving the track at Cocabana, dropping right to the back of the field. With team-mate Hennie Groenewald’s Audi stranded in the middle of the circuit after being T-boned by the leader the safety car was brought out while the debris was cleared.
Once racing got underway again there were only four laps to run and once Bonafede had worked his way through the field ahead of him, there was not enough race distance left for him to mount a serious challenge and he had to settle for fifth.
In the 12-lap feature race, Bonafede made a great start from third on the grid, but the car was not developing full boost and the subsequent lack of power saw him swallowed up by the chasing pack. Despite this he kept circulating in order to gain as many championship points as possible and crossed the line fifth about 18 seconds behind the winner.
Bonafede’s two fifth places keeps him in third place on the championship log, albeit with wore work to do to close the gap on the leaders next time out at Phakisa on 2 August.
