Padova Grand Prix is the third race on the 2009 IGSA World Cup racing calendar.
This event is located in the Italian Alps at Teolo Italy.
The track has three sections. A high speed run top section. Followed by a a series of seven hairpin corners, with a straight run out to the finish.
The key to racing here will be how clean and fast racers can take the hairpins to set up for the finish. The danger will be avoiding other competitors and crashes.
Padova Day 1
Padova Grand prix is a big event for this little community, and they had a “parade of nations” led in by a traditional Italian Renaissance band and flag bearers. The Australian’s thought it was pretty cool and had a lot of fun with it. They got to represent Australia in this mini Olympic style ceremony.
Qualifying
Again Team Orangatang displayed their super human skateboarding skills and were the total stand out on the first day of qualifying.
James Kelly qualifying first followed by Orangatang team mate Louis Pilloni second. The rest of the team were in the top ten, Patrick Switzer 4th and Jackson Shapiera 7th.
The Australians on the first day were Adam Yates 10th, Leeso 15th and Ash 16th. Eddie came in 47th.
Day Two
The second day of qualifying was full of surprises. There were major shifts in placings. Many of the stand outs on day one were pushing hard and crashed in Day 2.
Martin Seigrist pulled out an amazing time and finished the day as top qualifier.
Louis Pilloni lowered his time to retain number 2 place. And Aussie Ramon Konigshausen had his best ever qualifying result in a IGSA event by qualifying 3rd.
Jackson qualified 10th, Yatesy 18th, Ash 24th, Leeso 30th and Eddie 45th.
Race Day
Marcus has done a full Padova race report on the iGSA website.
The Australians skated well all day.
Jacko and Yatesy make it to the quarter finals but Jackson crashed at the first turn. He said he was hanging back, but got sucked in from the draft of the 2 guys in front and couldn’t break enough. He couldn’t catch up enough and finished 3rd in the race and 10th overall.
Yatsey was in the same heat, but crashed further down the hill and came 4th in the quarters and 18th overall.
Lesso and Ash both made it through the 1st round, but crashed in their second round heat. Finishing up 30th and 24th respectively.
The big result was Aussie Ramon Konigshausen finishing 7th overall.
The podium places when to 1. Martin Siegrist, Switzerland, 2. Patrick Switzer, Canada and 3. Stefan Ruefli, Switzerland.
HUGE big thanks to Lea Shapiera who send me these photos and gave me updates during the weekend. Sorry I ran out your mobile phone credits on Saturday!
