Weiland claims Coppa Shell world championship

James Weiland is Ferrari World Champion in the Coppa Shell. The American is the only Ferrari Challenge driver to have entered at least one race in all three series.

 

The race.

A multi-car collision at the start shuffled the pack by knocking many cars out of contention, including those on the front rows such as poleman Ken Abe (Formula Racing). Tani Hanna (Formula Racing) took advantage of this to jump into the lead, followed by Weiland. The pair outpaced the group and started to pull away.

The result appeared a foregone conclusion, but Weiland pulled out all the stops in the last lap. He passed Hanna and then repelled his attacks, to cross the line in first. Nevertheless, Hanna has reason enough to be happy about the Finali Mondiali weekend. Along with becoming the vice-world champion, he added the Coppa Shell title in the Ferrari Challenge Europe to his trophy cabinet.

Third place went to Makoto Fujiwara (Cornes Shiba), who on Saturday clinched the Coppa Shell title of the Ferrari Challenge Asia Pacific. Claude Senhoreti (Ferrari of Ft. Lauderdale) finished off the podium. Ken Abe arrived fifth after spending the final laps recovering positions as he tried to make up for the difficult start.