Marco Giltrap and Chris Van Der Drift took an easy win in Race 1 of the Lamborghini Super Trofeo Asia, at a Vallelunga circuit where the sun was obscured by dark clouds shortly before the start but luckily the rain did not fall during the 50 minutes of track action.
At the start Giltrap took the lead, but it took very little for Jonathan Cecotto to get behind the Absolute Racing man, who nevertheless strenuously defended the lead until the round of mandatory pit stops.
While not much had happened before the stops, the second half of the race offered repeated surprises, with errors made and penalties picked up by a host of drivers.
The only one who continued without making any mistakes was Van Der Drift, who crossed the finish line undisturbed as the overall and PRO Class winner, while behind him the standings underwent a bit of a reshuffle.
Pasarit Promsombat (Star Performance by Absolute), who rose to second overall after inheriting the Huracan from his teammate Lommahadthai and took the lead in the AM class, was given a 10s penalty for colliding with a rival, slipping to third place overall, but holding on in any case to the category win.
The overall and PRO runner-up slot therefore went to Xu/Wiser (Harmony Racing), especially due to Max's great comeback in the second half, while in fourth place finished Cecotto/Li, who celebrated the win in the PRO/AM class with the TRT Racing car in front of Lee/Wells (DW Evans GT), the latter picking up a Stop&Go penalty due to an irregularity committed during the pit stop.
Sixth place went to Darwin/Loh (Iron Lynx), second in the AM Class, with T.Walls/J.Walls (Objective Racing) completing the podium in the PRO/AM Class and finishing seventh overall.
Henry Kwong (Triple Ace Racing) instead took eighth place overall and third in AM, with Luo/Rouget (Vortex Racegraph) and Lee/Kwon (SQDA-GRIT Motorsport) finishing in the overall top 10.
Finally, at the rear of the group there were the protagonists of the Lamborghini Cup, where Zairel/Zairel (HZO Fortis Racing) took the chequered flag first by beating Supachai Weeraborwornpong (Siamgas Corse) and Ma Chi Min (Kam Lung Racing).
It was a day to forget for Tai/Huang (BC Racing), sanctioned with a Drive-Through penalty for entering with the pits closed as the pit stop window had already expired, and then excluded with a black flag for not having served the penalty.
Kumas Prabakaran (Iron Lynx) and Zhilong Kang (TRT Racing) both retired.
