Mugello, Italy, 06-10 November 2013
After three years in Spain, Ferrari’s Finali Mondiali returned home
to Italy, and the Mugello circuit in the picturesque Tuscan hill
country to the North of Florence. The gathering featured the final
rounds of the worldwide 458 Challenge Series, F1 Clienti and XX
Programme track activity, together with Corse Clienti laps and
free laps for clients on the Sunday afternoon. The activity started
on Wednesday 06 November with free practice sessions for the
458 Challenge participants, many of whom had come from the
Pacific region and America, and had never driven at the circuit
before. Thus, it was an opportunity to try and learn the demanding
track, to try and equalise their footing with the European
contingent, many of whom were familiar with it.
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Thursday was given over to four official practice sessions, two for
the Trofeo Pirelli Coppa Shell/NA competitors and two for those in
the Trofeo Pirelli/APAC group. These were interspersed with
Corse Clienti activity on the track. The official qualifying sessions
took place on Friday morning, with Race 1 in each group in the
afternoon, whilst the XX Programme participants and F1 Clienti
runners also had track time during the day. With around thirty
competitors in each race, there was quite often crowding, and
exchanges of paintwork or more during the races, leaving the
mechanics plenty to do between races to try and repair those that
assaulted and those that had been assaulted. Strangely enough
most of the battle scars happened during the dry races on
Saturday, whilst the Finals on Sunday, which were run in wet
conditions, didn’t suffer the same rate of attrition. Even though
there was quite a disparity of speed between the front runners and
tail-enders, there were good battles going on throughout the field
in all the races for both groups, and the number of cars on track,
and spread of speed, meant that there was nearly always activity
for the spectators to watch at most points on the circuit, after the
first couple of laps.
Both Finals were closely fought at the front of the field, with
Giosue Rizzuto putting a “firm” move on race leader David
Gostner on the very last lap, to snatch victory and the Coppa
Shell World Championship by 0.529sec. In the Trofeo Pirelli race
it was Philipp Baron who stood on the top step of the podium to
take the Trofeo Pirelli World Championship, who managed to eke
out a slight advantage over Daniel Mancinelli in the closing
stages. He was being closed down by the battling duo of Stefan
Gai and Sergey Chukanov, but held on by 0.5sec and 1.0sec
respectively to be runner-up. The Challenge runners weekend
didn’t end with the races on Sunday, as they had the opportunity
to stay on for tests of the 2014 458 Challenge Evoluzione on the
Monday.
The paddock area at Mugello became a Ferrari “tent town”, as
apart from the three large tented areas for the Challenge cars,
there was a massive central display marquee with a variety of
classic, F1 and the Ferrari supercar line-up of GTO (288), F40,
F50, Enzo and LaFerrari. Adjacent to this was a showroom with
the current range on display, another with a Corse Clienti display,
yet another was a reception lounge, then there was the Ferrari
Store, the children’s play tent and the dining marquee.
Despite miserable weather on the Sunday, with low cloud and
almost persistent rain, around 15,000 people turned up to wish
farewell to Felipe Massa, who was making his last European
appearance for his fans as a member of the Ferrari team, after 10
years with the Scuderia. He did demonstration laps with test
driver Marc Gene, although the weather wasn’t conducive to any
fancy tricks, and at the end was warmly applauded by the crowd,
and presented with a trophy in recognition of his service to Ferrari,
which was almost as big as him!
Felipe Massa will drive next season for Team Williams.
Race Results – Podium
Trofeo Pirelli Coppa Shell/NA Race 1
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 119 Team Ukraine Andrii Lebed
2nd 181 Ineco/MP Erich Prinoth
3rd 160 Ineco/MP David Gostner
Trofeo Pirelli Coppa Shell/NA Race 2
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 124 Motor/Malucelli Giosue Rizzuto
2nd 160 Ineco/MP David Gostner
3rd 377 Ferrari of Beverly Hills Harry Cheung
Trofeo Pirelli/APAC Race 1
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 91 Octane 126 Philipp Baron
2nd 599 Motor/Malucelli Max Blancardi
3rd 21 Forza Service Giacomo Stratta
Trofeo Pirelli/APAC Race 2
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 23 Motor/Piacenza Daniel Mancinelli
2nd 91 Octane 126 Philipp Baron
3rd 8 CDP Dario Case
Trofeo Pirelli Coppa Shell/NA Final
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 124 Motor/Malucelli Giosue Rizzuto
2nd 160 Ineco/MP David Gostner
3rd 199 Autohaus Saggio Dirk Adamski
Trofeo Pirelli/APAC Final
Position Race # Team Driver
1st 91 Octane 126 Philipp Baron
2nd 23 Motor/Piacenza Daniel Mancinelli
3rd 99 Rossocorsa Stefano Gai
Central Paddock Display
Modern
Model Colour Chassis #
Ferrari GTO (288) Red/Black-Red 58329
Ferrari F40 Red/Red 77107
Ferrari F50 Red/Black-Red 106150
Ferrari Enzo (Pre-series) Red/Red Proto # 4
Ferrari LaFerrari Red/Red 194527
Ferrari 126 C F1 Red 052
Ferrari F1-90 F1 Red 117
Ferrari F1-2000 F1 Red 202
Classic
Ferrari 250 MM PF Berlinetta Red 0298MM
Ferrari 250 GT TdF Berlinetta Red-Blue Stripe 0629GT
Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta Silver- Tric’ Nose Band 2839GT
Ferrari 250 GTO Red 3809GT
Ferrari 250 LM Silver-RWB Stripes 5995
Ferrari 275 GTB/C Silver 09007
Ferrari 365 GTB4C Red 14429
Ferrari 512 BB/LM Red 29507
Ferrari GTO Evoluzione Red 70205
Ferrari F40 GT Red-Yellow 93813
Modern GT Race Cars
Ferrari 360 GT Black-White 2068
Ferrari 430 GT2 Red-RWG Stripes 2622
Ferrari 458 GT3 Red 3266
Ferrari 458 GT3 G-AM Red 3448
Ferrari 458 GT2 Red-RWG Stripes 2822
Keith Bluemel
11/2013
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