The first weekend of July was destination Portimiao, Portugal, and the amazing Autodromo international Algarve!. Arguably the best circuit of the season but also one of the most difficult to master. This weekend proudly carrying the logo of new season sponsor “HALO PSA” and excited to have them supporting Kyle for the rest of the season. www.halopsa.com
Sunshine and temps of 30 degrees forecast for the whole weekend Kyle was confident he could have a strong weekend and making further progress up the order. Thursday morning practice got off to a unfortunate start with a trip to the medical centre and literally a early shower after a unusual malfunction of a fuel quick connector after just a few laps resulted in an unexpected dosing but no damage done and returned to action in the afternoon getting to grips with the circuit. Next Friday timed practice and improvements made each session finishing the day with a 1 min 54.4 secs and P15 on the time sheets beating his previous best time by 1.5 seconds.
Saturday morning and 2 x 40 min qualifying sessions ahead to set fastest lap possible. Within just a few laps Kyle set a personal best of 1 min 53.8 seconds, however the session was cut short by a electrical gremlin, unfortunately resolved with only a few minutes of the session remaining. The afternoon session confident to improve and pushing hard early in the session, a small error at turn 11 and a 100 km/h crash into the gravel. Another quick trip to the medical centre but no damage done except the missed opportunity to improve his time resulting in P15 on the grid for Sundays race.
Race day , a little further back than hoped on the grid but confident for a good race. Another rocket start, P11 after lap 1 and soon made progress to close the gap to the lead group. Staying with the lead group for the remaining of the race resulted in a PB lap of 1min 53.3 secs and finishing P10 just 2.1 secs from the win.
Even with numerous incidents Kyle’s another step forward and a best result of the season (in terms of gap to the front) and largely down to such an amazing hard working team.
