Giacomo Altoé crushed the competition by triumphing in the final race of the Trofeo Pirelli - Trofeo Pirelli AM of the 2024 Ferrari Challenge at Imola with a superb run to beat Luigi Coluccio and Bence Valint.
The Emil Frey Racing driver got off to a perfect start from pole by maintaining the lead but Luca Ludwig, starting from third place, made a nice overtaking move for second on Philipp Baron at the Tamburello chicane and set about hunting down the Italian.
Altoé tried to put a bit of a gap between himself and the German to allow him to catch his breath and not be put under pressure at every braking point. Baron, in turn, tried to maintain the pace of the first two, but without success.
The Austrian from the Scuderia Praha Racing team quickly lost ground from Altoé and Ludwig and had to deal with the attacks from Bence Valint, winner of Thursday’s Race 1, which took place in the pouring rain.
There was a dramatic turn of events after nine minutes of racing, when Ludwig came into the pits due to a problem with his Mertel Motorsport Ferrari 296. The German then returned to the track, but one lap down on all the others.
At the same time, Baron was given a five-second penalty to add to his race time for having exceeded the track limits too many times. After battling with Valint and Luigi Coluccio for second place, the penalty put paid to his hopes of taking second place. A great overtaking move on the penultimate lap secured Coluccio (Radicci Automobili) second place.
Altoé meanwhile had an apparently easy time without his main rival. But with 11 minutes to go, his team-mate Hanno Laskowski spun at Tamburello, getting stuck in the gravel.
This triggered the first Safety Car of the day, neutralising the almost 30s advantage Altoé had managed to build up in the first 19 minutes of the race.
In the Trofeo Pirelli AM class, Hendrik Viol took the Scuderia Praha Racing 296 to victory ahead of the already crowned champion Claus Zibrandtsen (Formula Racing) and Michael Verhagen.
