The renovated Monza circuit delivered a bitter result in the latest race weekend for Alex Fontana. The Brianza track was hosting the 3-hour endurance round of the GT World Challenge Europe in which Fontana was sharing the #74 Ferrari 296 GT3 entered by Kessel Racing in the Bronze Cup, with “Hash” – the American AF Academy driver – and Ben Tuck.
The temple of speed’s few corners are all challenging and the #74 crew started the weekend on an uphill climb. Qualifying, determined by the combined time of the three drivers, resulted in a difficult grid position of 44th and 15th in the Bronze Cup class. Nonetheless, Fontana – who this season has been more accustomed to the Porsche 911 GT3 R – managed to record the crew’s best time of 1:45.113, actually ending his session close to the top ten, in 12th position overall out of the 52 cars entered for the Monza round.
Unfortunately, the race was over even before the Ticino driver had had a chance tp put on his overalls, gloves and helmet: “Hash” was in fact involved in an accident towards the braking area for the Roggia, being rear-ended through no fault of his own, with irreparable damage caused to the Lugano team’s Ferrari, which was therefore forced to retire on the first lap of the three-hour race. The start at Monza is always a lottery, characterised by chaos, especially with more than 50 cars on the grid.
It was an unfortunate incident that brought to a premature end a weekend of preparation for the forthcoming endurance races, as the Fontana/”Hash” duo will be engaged in the Indianapolis 8 Hours on 4-5 October, remaining within the GT3 - SRO scene, before tackling the Barcelona round of the GT Open next Sunday.
Alex Fontana
“It was a real shame to end the wonderful weekend at Monza in this way. There were so many fans and it was great to represent the Prancing Horse with the colours of Kessel Racing and I would like to thank the outfit once again for the opportunity. Unfortunately the starts on this circuit are difficult, we were unlucky, but now Hash and I and the team will focus on preparing for Barcelona and then Indianapolis.”