Dubai Kartdrome hosted Round 11 of the 2015 SWS Sprint Series on Monday night, with Anjum Shaikh and Vincent Fraisse winning the senior races, Adrian Jones tops in the SWS Masters, and Seif Al Naggar and Oliver Walton doing the business in the junior category.
It was clear from qualifying that the racing for the 30 drivers would be close in the SWS Seniors class as the top dozen drivers were within one second and the difference between the top five a mere tenth of a second – reigning SWS champion Atef Al Barwani claimed pole position.
In Race 1 Anjum Shaikh shone as he turned seventh place on the grid into a win, edging Rai Azzam by 0.087 of a second as they crossed the finish line.
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Ahmed Al Hammadi claimed third, albeit three seconds behind the leading duo, with schoolgirl Abi Birch fourth, Paul Chatenay fifth, Romaldo Rabroy sixth, Rashid Bin Humaidan seventh, Maz Nawar eighth, Hussein Umid Ali ninth and SWS debutant Nicolas Fargeas rounding out the top ten.
Newcomer Vincent Fraisse, a French karting champion, signaled his intent by qualifying second but had a tough introduction to the rigours of SWS in the UAE in the first race and found himself finishing down in 12th.
In Race 2, Fraisse showed his true class, carving his way through the field to claim victory – the first time a driver has won on his debut SWS race event at the Kartdrome.
Behind him Azzam was second again, ahead of Labrooy in third who was chased across the line by Nawaz, Umid Ali, Birch, Shaikh, Allan Khoury, Chatenay and Ali Al Mansoori tenth.
Azzam's double second place was enough to see him walk away with the winner's trophy for combined race points, with Shaikh second and Birch third in the points table.
In the ‘race-within-a-race’ SWS Masters, Adrian Jones did the treble by claiming wins in both races and thus ended top points scorer on the night. Porus Nashir was second and Ziad Merhi third.
In the SWS juniors a new format of combined practice and qualifying followed by two races was introduced and attracted 20 drivers to the grid.
From the outset Seif Al Naggar set the pace by claiming top spot in qualifying and then turning that into a win after a race-long duel with Jakub Fitsimmons who finished second and Oliver Walton in third.
Kamal Agha drove a storming race and turned 19th on the grid to fourth place, with Luis Velasco fifth and Maxine Dubois sixth.
Race 2 saw the leading trio battling it out for all nine laps, this time with Patrick Debattista also in the mix. There was little to separate the quartet as they crossed the line with Walton taking a narrow victory ahead of Al Naggar, De Battista and Fitsimmons in his slipstream. Velasco was fifth and Dubois sixth.
Round 12 of the 2015 SWS Sprint Series takes place at Dubai Kartdrome on 5 October 2015.