JONES ON CRUISE CONTROL

Christian Jones scored a perfect lights-to-flag victory in Round 5 of the Porsche
Carrera Cup Asia at the Zhuhai International Circuit today, opening up a margin of
more than two seconds from GruppeM Racing’s Tim Sugden by the flag. Team
Jebsen’s Darryl O’Young was third, after an oil pressure warning light gave him a
scare early on.

Jones proved untouchable throughout the 12-lap race, and the Australian was never
seriously challenged after getting a textbook start from pole: “I knew I’d got a good
start so could take a good apex into Turn 1, which gave me a good line out of the corner.
I knew I had the pace.”

From there, he went about opening up a gap from Sugden, setting the fastest lap
of the race: “You really want the race to end when you’re leading! It seems to take
forever when you’re winning,” he said. “I saw Tim start to push, but the next lap
he’d lose it. I was hoping he’d have a scrap with Darryl, but that didn’t happen.”

Despite being on the podium for the third time in succession, nothing short of a
win is acceptable to Sugden, so he wasn’t pleased with 2nd. The Briton admits
he hasn’t managed to master the 4.3km Zhuhai track, and is not one of its fans:
“This is probably my worst circuit of the whole season. Christian drove very, very
well and has done all weekend. I just hope my season is going to get better.”

O’Young felt lucky to finish on the podium, and his 3rd place narrows the gap to
Class A points leader Christian Menzel of Team StarChase to just five points: “I
saw the oil pressure warning light come on which is always a big scare, so I
backed off right away, and by that time Tim and Christian (Jones) were away.”
The Hong Kong racer memorably won the title here in 2006 with a double victory
on the Zhuhai track, but that achievement could go to Jones this weekend. Said
O’Young: “This is one of my best circuits, but with little things here and there,
it just hasn’t come together this weekend.”

The expected charge from the third row of the grid by Championship leader
Menzel never materialised. The German, who celebrates his birthday today, was
plagued with a gearbox problem throughout the race: “It takes too long to engage
gears. We thought it was a sensor, but it isn’t. We’re trying to find out what the
problem is and fix it for this afternoon’s race.”

The Porsche Carrera Cup Asia continues this afternoon, with Rounds 6 held over
12 laps of the Zhuhai International Circuit, and Jones on pole.

Round 5 top six result:

1 #18 Christian JONES (AUS) Christian Jones (AUS) 20:15.209

2 #88 Tim SUGDEN (GBR) GruppeM Racing (CHN) +2.260

3 #55 Darryl O’YOUNG (HKG) Team Jebsen (HKG) +3.749

4 #8 Marchy LEE (HKG) Team BetterLife (CHN) +8.549

5 #99 Christian MENZEL (GER) Team StarChase (CHN) +9.590

6 #7 Matthew MARSH (HKG) SC Global Racing (SIN) +15.378