The one seen in action during the three days at the Misano World Circuit for the round of the Ferrari Challenge, Trofeo Pirelli Europe, is a very fat Marco Zanasi.
The driver from Maranello showed his usual courage at the wheel of the Ferrari 488 Challenge edited by Pinetti Motorsport and was already among the best from free practice.
“Marco showed himself very well in free practice” – says Andrea Belicchi (Pinetti Motorsport trainer) – “and he was always first in his category and kept a pace at a professional level in the race simulation and in qualifying. We’ve often raced at the pace of third overall, but we’ve certainly never fallen out of the top five. Considering the level of this championship, which includes ex-F1 drivers like Sutil and talented young Formula kids, the form Zanasi has shown has been remarkable. Really good to be at such a high level.”
The first day on Saturday began with a qualifying session in which the driver of the Colorno racing team, in second place, had to give up pole position due to a track limit.
A sword of Damocles that, after a bad start, punishes the Modenese several times even in the race, resulting in a drive-through that extinguishes any dream of glory.
Seventeenth overall, ninth in the AM class at the Trofeo Pirelli, clearly hides the good things that Zanasi shows as a protagonist at the end of a day.
“In the first qualifying session, pole was taken away from us because of a track limit” – emphasizes Belicchi – “which turned out to be a real stroke of luck for almost all of our competitors. The penalties were heaps because on a track more dedicated to bikes, the curbs are very low and you can’t easily see them from the cockpit, especially when you’re slipstreaming. In Race 1 Marco got off to a bad start but was a solid second and caught up on first. After exceeding the distance several times, we received the drive-through penalty. Races over and dreams of the podium finally faded.”
After the bitterness on Sunday was digested, it was the blindfolded goddess who stood up as the protagonist and on the red of Maranello there was an oil leak from the power steering pump that advised the team to go back to the garage and solve the overtime of the Time error useful for race 2.
Zanasi, starting from the fifth box, made himself the cause of a poor start, but he threw his heart over the obstacle and climbed to ninth overall and sixth in the AM category.
“The second qualifying was punished by a problem with the power steering pump,” concludes Belicchi, “but our guys disassembled half the car and managed to fix everything. The start of Race 2 was terrible but Marco had insane race pace and was certainly the fastest in his category. Only one was more and won the overall victory. We were racing towards the podium but the safety car that came out on the last two laps hampered his comeback a bit.”
