Gurrieri wins twice in the Coppa Italia opening event
Paraplegic driver Raffaele Gurrieri dominated the Coppa Italia Turismo season opener at Vallelunga. At the wheel of his CUPRA Leon VZ run by Scuderia Girasole, Gurrieri set pole position and took two comfortable wins, beating the Audi cars of Ramazan Kaya in Race 1 and Andrea Visdomini in Race 2.
Gurrieri took a lights-to-flag win from the pole in Race 1; lap after lap he increased his lead by a few tenths, keeping Kaya at a safe distance and winning by 2.4 seconds; behind them Fabrizio Fede started well from P4 in his CUPRA TCR moving ahead of Andrea Visdomini’s Audi and completed the podium.
In the second race, Gurrieri led once again from the pole, while Giacomo Orioli made a thundering start from P6 in his Audi DSG and leapt up to P2, before he was soon passed by Visdomini, Kaya and Fede. The latter went off in lap 2, causing a safety car intervention. After the restart, Kaya lost control going down to the Cimini bends, spun off and rejoined at the back. Gurrieri took his second win of the day from Visdomini and Koray Kamiloğlu, while Sebastian Gavazza overtook Orioli for P4 with the latter then penalised by 25 seconds for overtaking during the safety car period.
Series newcomers Orioli (Planet Motorsport) and Gavazza (Casals Motorsport) shared the honours in the DSG class at the wheel of their Audi.
The next event will be at Mugello on May 10/11.
Race 1
- Raffaele Gurrieri (Scuderia Girasole, CUPRA Leon VZ), 15 laps
- Ramazan Kaya (BF Motorsport, Audi RS 3 LMS), 2.419
- Fabrizio Fede (Team Cars Racing, CUPRA TCR), 22.319
Race 2
- Raffaele Gurrieri (Scuderia Girasole, CUPRA Leon VZ), 13 laps
- Andrea Visdomini (Next Motorsport, Audi RS 3 LMS), 4.572
- Koray Kamiloğlu (Erven Maden H2K Racing, Audi RS 3 LMS), 5.989
Championship points
- R. Gurrieri, 30 pts; 2. R. Kaya, 22; 2. A. Visdomini, 22
Picture: Claudio Signori
