Autorlando Porsche 997 finishes third • La Torre Viper of Romagnoli-Larini dominates GTS class • One-two for Scuderia Giudici in GTB

Vallelunga, 21 April 2007 Andrea Montermini and Michele Maceratesi won the Pro-Am race that has inaugurated the first International GT Open event of the season, in a sunny and warm day in Vallelunga, aboard the Ferrari 430 of the reigning team, Playteam SaraFree. The Italian team dominated the race, at first with its second car but poleman Max Busnelli lost all chances of victory when a tyre exploded on lap 17, shortly before the driver change. The two operations were done during the same pit-stop, which is not allowed by the rules, and the car had to go a stop-and-go. The Ferrari had been already damaged in a contact in the morning, during qualifying. It eventually finished 7 th overall. With the GTA Mosler of Guerrero-Aicart out of contention as from lap 10 after damages in the rear following a contact, the battle for second place saw an intense fight between the GPC Ferraris of Peter-Bonetti and Mowlem-Roda and the Advance Engineering’s ones of Livio-Pasini and Gattuso-Frigerio, which exchanged positions quite often. Pasini emerged from this group and conquered the runner-up position, while Bonetti lost ground following a spin and a contact in the hairpin. In the meantime, Sundberg on the RSV 430 and Lietz on the Autorlando Porsche 997 had brilliantly climbed through the field to conquer the third and fourth positions.


Unfortunately, Sundberg and Romero would fall from the podium and drop three positions after the race, because of a 20 second penalty for having accomplished the driver change in less time than the imposed minimum of 60 seconds. Starting last after the cancellation of all its times for the non-conformity of some aerodynamic elements, the SunRed SR 21 of Jordi Gené was already in tenth position when it had to retire on lap 9. The other SR21 finishes 14th. Scuderia La Torre’s Vipers dominated the GTS category, with Romagnoli-Larini clinching the victory and Armetta-Marchetti finishing third, the two pairs framing in the podium the Viper of Racing Box driven Azzoli-Mocci. In GTB, it seemed Nannini-Giudici on their Ferrari 360 Challenge could not approached but a gearbox problem two laps from the end deprived the pair of a certain success, which nevertheless remained in Scuderia Giudici’s hand, as Fabrizio Gini and Beppe Arlotti took the laurels.