Ongaro from Kilic as qualifying gets underway in Manila
With qualifying getting underway at the Philippine Masters in Manila this morning, it was Team Associated’s Davide Ongaro who topped the first of the 4 scheduled qualifiers from Mugen Seiki’s Burak Kilic. Having topped yesterday’s seeding from Infinity’s Kouki Kato, Ongaro completed 9-laps of the Circulo Verde Track over the 5-minute qualifier with Kilic, the only other drive to make 9-laps, just 1-second off. It was to be a frustrating start to qualifying for Kato as he crashed on his opening lap and needed to be marshal. Losing 4-seconds, the fired up Japanese driver would go on to set the fastest lap by an impressive margin as he recovered to salvage a P5. Making it an all European based Top 3, Italy’s Mattia Polito managed to go ahead of Kyosho’s Ryan Lutz on the final lap. Seeded No.8, the American lost 3/10ths of a second to the Sworkz driver on their 8th lap giving Polito 3rd for the round by just 0.048. Behind them reigning Asian Buggy Championships Champion Christian Wolhuter completed the Top 6, this weekend’s second round of the Cayote backed championship the Australian Sworkz driver’s first outing of the season.
