Well, it’s been proven; wet or dry, the Toyota Vios does provide intense entertainment regardless if it is in the hands of the largely amateur celebrities, or the professionals in the Vios Challenge’s Super Sporting class.
Sunday’s weather was the total opposite from the day before. The sun stayed out despite the presence of some thick clouds and the pros all were all excited to push the Vios to the limit. Their only hesitation – the narrow racing track. An opinion shared by all racers.
First to thrill the crowd was the Super Sporting category. Tengku Djan had already secured pole position, with Mark Darwin second on the grid.
The pack was tight right at the rolling start, luckily without any serious incident except for James Veerapen who clipped a wall and broke his car’s rim. But by the second lap the top two drivers had built up a gap, itself widening by each lap as Tengku Djan found time no one else could.
The checkered flag dropped with Djan first, and Mark Darwin 15 seconds behind. However, we are told that this result is still provisional due to an investigation, we heard, regarding the winner’s hand brake.
Then the Promotional category drivers were up next. Shawn Lee, winner from the first race the day before took off at the start almost unchallenged despite Shukri Yahaya and Danny Koo in close proximity. The beatboxer built up enough of a lead near the end and seemed to have coasted, saving his tyres doing so.
There was much more commotion midfield, as Fattah Amin, a DNF (Did Not Finish) from the day before, made his way forward only find himself behind Diana Danielle. The latter was by far the most impressive women driver in the field at fourth position, even if Fattah appeared to have a bit more speed. Then tragedy struck as Fattah saw a small gap and snuck in between Diana’s car and the wall. Unfortunately the space closed up, the two cars made contact, with Diana’s no.15 Vios came out the worse, immediately pulling over the side. Fattah’s too eventually had to retire, his tyres totally shredded.
Shawn won his second race, with Shukri second and Danny Koo taking the final podium position.
The second race of the Sporting category was even closer, as much of the grid stayed close almost throughout the 18 lap race. Eyes were glued to the top two positions, with second placed Patrick Tam having better lap times compared to race leader Ken Foo. But with the narrow concrete-barrier lined racing track being what it is, there was just no getting past. Patrick was even given a warning flag for unsporting conduct mid-way after a few gentle bumper taps.
With the final lap board appearing on Lap 17, Patrick made a do-or-die attempt on the outside going into Turn 1. Being on the dirtier line, he slid wide into the barricades and retired. Shanmuganathan whose view of the incident was shielded by other cars, ran into Patrick’s car and duly retired.
Kenneth Koh seized the advantage and took second place behind Ken Foo, while Brendon Lim was third. Thus, both races in the Sporting and Promotional class were done with.
The Super Sporting guys came up to the grid again, this time with a reversed grid formation for the top three finisher of round 1. Plus, Tengku Djan also had to carry a 20kg ballast. He had his strategy figured out as you can see from the video below.
A quick start gave him a peek, and dove inside Mark Darwin for second position. Next was Shafiq Ali and Tengku Djan completed that pass too as early as lap 3, but not without drama. The two cars were side-by-side into turn 10 with Shafiq on the inside, but touched at the turn-in with car no.12 into a half spin.
As if that would rattle Tengku Djan, because he collected the car and ended in front of Shafiq after the latter had to retire due to damage; it was a lead Djan kept right to the checkered flag.
There were more thrills further down the field when Kenny Lee was engaged in a serious battle with Akina Teo, James Veerapen and Dato Mohd Nasri. Kenny finally managed to make a serious move on Lap 12 and James capitalised on the situation to also move into 9th position.
A large portion of the visitors may have attended the Toyota Gazoo Racing Festival to meet the celebrities, but they were definitely entertained by the racing too. Also impressive were drift demos using a pair of Toyota 86s piloted by the D1GP stars of Masato Kawabata and Hideyuki Fujino.
The total number of visitors for the weekend was over 28,000. It wouldn’t be difficult to believe that most, if not all, would like to come to the second round, scheduled on 25-16 November 2017 at MAEPS, Serdang.