The Plazmaman Pro Am class of the 2023 Yokohama World Time Attack Challenge has been taken out by Feras Qartoumy. The Texan came to WTAC as a total newbie, but stamped his authority on the Plazmaman Pro Am class with a 1:27.016.
Heading into Day 2 the class was led by American Feras Qartoumy’s C6 Corvette, with Wayne Lee in the Tanuki S13 less than half a second off his bumper. Feras and the thundering twin-turbo 7-litre Z06 Corvette had never raced at Sydney Motorsport Park before WTAC so the learning curve has been steep.
“We don’t have anything like Turn 1 at home and, if you ruin Turn 1 you ruin the lap. So I ruin that every single time. The difference is the corners [at Sydney Motorsport Park] are a little bit slower, but are very long. It is a smaller track, but very technical and everything here is really late; it requires patience and I don’t have a lot of that! [laughs]”
By the lunch on Day 2, Richard Perini had his VR38-powered Ginetta G55 on song to climb into second place with a 1:27.527.
In an unfortunate turn of events the Tanuki S13 lost a wheel between turns 1 and 2, collecting the wall rear-first and knocking it out of both Plazmaman Pro Am for Wayne Lee, and Emtron Pro class for Tim Slade who was sharing the drive. Wayne’s 1:27.540 was enough to keep him in third, however.
Sitting just of the podium, Drew Hall’s Croydon Racing Developments R34 GT-R Skyline was also in the hunt with a 1:27.573. Unfortunately a cam sensor issue knocked him out of the shootout and he had to settle for fourth behind Tanuki.