Motorsport: Fabio Leimer convinces in the Ferrari

AutoSprintCH had made it public at the beginning of July: the young Octane126 team from Wallisellen offered Fabio Leimer the second F458 Evo in the Challenge Europa Trofeo Pirelli alongside their title favorite Björn Grossmann (D) for the first Ferrari Racing Days event in Russia. The man from Aargau accepted and competed for the first time in a GT car last weekend on the Sochi GP circuit in front of around 20,000 spectators.

Despite his almost two-year break from racing, the 2013 GP2 champion showed that he has not forgotten how to drive. In 2015, Leimer took a compulsory break, and this season he is returning to his roots: In the Kart-SM sponsored by autobau, he is fighting for the title in the new OK Senior class. Although Fabio Leimer lost the battle for victory in the two Challenge heats to his German teammate, the rookie had all the other Ferraristi under control in both heats. This included Björn Grossmann's strongest title rival Philip Baron from Austria, from whom he thus took important points.

Fabio Leimer drove exactly the same lap times
"It couldn't have gone better," enthuses Jannick Bardy, the race engineer at Team Octane126. "In the beginning, Fabio needed some time to get used to the car. But after that, they sometimes drove lap times that were exactly the same to the tenth of a second." He is not surprised that the Formula 1 and LMP1-experienced Swiss was unable to do anything against the German, even though there was no team order: "It's not so easy to get close to Björn. He's been driving in the Ferrari Challenge for years, so we also disclosed the data so Fabio could benefit from his experience."

www.octane126.com
www.fabioleimer.ch
Photos: Octane126