Following Saturday’s Feature Race at Sepang when Racing Engineering’s drivers Norman Nato and Jordan King finished 3rd and 5th Sunday’s Sprint Race saw Jordan starting 4th and Norman 6th on the reversed grid. The weather for the race was even hotter than yesterday with air and track temperatures of 32° and 48° respectively with the humidity again at 55%. Norman and Jordan, like all the other drivers, were starting on the Pirelli P Zero Orange hard compound and, with the high tack temperatures, it would be important not to overuse them in the early stages of the race.
Both Jordan and Norman made good starts and the young Frenchman passed Lynn to lie in 5th and through the opening lap the two men were running very closely and as they raced down the main straight to start lap two Norman was able to pass Jordan. However, as they braked for the first corner the two Racing Engineering cars made contact and Norman spun to a halt in the middle of the track and was forced to retire. Jordan was able to continue but he reported over the team radio that his steering was bent and he had also received damage to his front wing.
Following a brief Safety Car period, as Norman’s car was removed from the track, Jordan began to struggle with the handling of his car and he quickly began to fall back down the field as he was running at over a second and a half a lap slower than the other cars. By lap ten he had fallen to 13th and on the following lap he pitted to serve a ten second penalty he had received for the earlier incident with his teammate and to have a new nose and a set of the Pirelli P Zero White medium compound tyres fitted. He returned to the track in last position but, despite setting some very fast laps, he was unable to finish any higher than 14th position.
A very disappointing day for the Racing Engineering team with no points scored on a day when both men could have been on the podium. There will now be an eight week break before the final race weekend of the season at the Yas Marina Circuit in the United Arab Emirates.
Sebastien Viger, Technical Director:"What we saw today is just unacceptable at this level. Without pointing the finger at anyone, you need to take special care and have respect when it's your team mate - even more when you, he and the team are fighting for high positions in the championship. We all lost out big today.”
Norman Nato:"There isn’t a lot to say about today’s race. The start was OK and I was in P5 before the accident. It’s a shame as I think we could have fought for the win today. It’s a shame.”
Jordan King:"Another great start, which is positive. they’ve all been good this year. Unfortunately, and disappointingly for everyone in the team we couldn’t get a result. The team did a great job at the pit stop changing the front wing and tyres, which allowed me to push at the end of the race. Disappointing as we could not take home more points after showing great pace this weekend.”
