Alessandro Zanardi returns to the cockpit of his BMW Z4 GT3 in torrential rain in Slovakia.

Slovakia Ring (SK), 23rd August 2014. Alessandro Zanardi (IT) is back behind the wheel of his BMW Z4 GT3: this weekend the 47-year-old BMW works driver contests the fourth round of the 2014 Blancpain Sprint Series, which is held at Slovakia Ring near Bratislava (SK). Today, Saturday, the qualifying practice and the qualifying race were on the schedule for Zanardi and the ROAL Motorsport team that enters his car. He finished the hectic qualifying race, which had to be red flagged twice and was hit by torrential rain, in tenth, meaning he will start tomorrow’s main race from this position.

Zanardi was ninth on the grid for the qualifying race, which began at 14:45 local time. Just in time for the start, the first drops of rain were reported over the track. With a very good start, Zanardi improved to sixth as the lights went out. But on the first lap the safety car had to be deployed after a massive crash in the first corner. Soon afterwards the race was red flagged for the first time, as a safety barrier had to be repaired. In addition, torrential rain had started to pour down.

After a break of over 20 minutes, the race was re-started behind the safety car with conditions still very wet and tricky. On the slippery track, Zanardi spun his BMW Z4 GT3 and lost several positions, dropping down the order to 16th. Halfway through the race Zanardi completed his mandatory pit stop before the safety car came out again, as a car had stopped on track. During this safety car period it started to pour down again so, as there was too much water on the track making it impossible to drive, the race was red flagged for the second time. After another break of more than half an hour the race was re-started once more behind the safety car. The clock showed 28 more minutes to go. Zanardi was 12th at that time. Over the remaining time, he improved by two positions and brought his BMW Z4 GT3 home safely in tenth.

“It was a very tiring race because in these conditions it was easy to make a mistake”, Zanardi reported afterwards. “I have a lot of experience and I know it can’t get worse than this with the rain. Shortly before the second red flag I had just changed tyres, so I tried to catch up with the safety car. I was in second gear and almost lost the car four times. I shifted down to first gear and still the car was going all over the place. I’ve never experienced anything like this, it was just unreal. Besides that, I had a very good start, but then unfortunately someone hit me on my left side. After that the car had huge understeer when turning right, and most of the corners are right handers here. That certainly compromised my race. But tomorrow is the day that matters most and we managed to keep more or less the same starting position for tomorrow. We will fix the car and hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for all of us without any rain.”