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Schmid Wants Double Title For Al Nabooda Racing
Rising star Clemens Schmid is ready to take on Saudi Arabia’s Abdulaziz Al Faisal on home territory next month to give Al Nabooda Racing hope of a double title triumph in the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Middle East.
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Schmid and team-mate Karim Al Azhari have already put the Dubai outfit in command of the team championship at the half way point in the season, and now the young Austrian driver wants to revive his hopes of snatching the driver’s crown.
While Al Nabooda Racing have a 20-point team series lead over Al-Faisal’s Saudi Falcons, Schmid trails the defending individual champion by 12 points in the race for the drivers’ title.
That is despite the fact that he has won four out of six rounds in this season’s Porsche GT3 Cup series, a freak mechanical failure having put him out of Round 3 in Abu Dhabi and handed the advantage to Al Faisal.
“As a racing driver you always want to win the drivers’ title, but first you have to look what is the best for the team, and then you think about yourself,” said the young Austrian. “It will be a big challenge to stop Abdulaziz from winning the title again, but if I work hard, and push hard, I think I can catch him.”
Schmid has a superb record since entering the Porsche GT3 Cup series at the start of last season. He has topped qualifying for 13 of the 15 rounds he has contested, and converted ten of those pole positions into race victories.
But he is the first to highlight the key role played by team-mate Al Azhari, currently a clear third in the drivers’ championship, in making Al Nabooda Racing the leading team in the 12-round Porsche one-make championship.
“We have formed a good relationship and become good friends,” said Schmid. “We are also learning from each other. In some corners he is faster than me so I try to follow him there. In others he can learn from me, so we are working well together.”
“Karim has performed really well so far this season. You have to remember that it’s only his first full season in the GT3 cup car, which is very difficult to drive. I think he will improve massively in the rest of the season because you can see his potential and if he gets a good lap like in Abu Dhabi, he is faster than Abdulaziz.
Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Middle East, team standings:
1. Al Nabooda Racing 245pts
2. Saudi Falcons 225pts
3. Team Bahrain 202pts
4. Frijns Structural Steel ME (QAT) 93pts
5. Gebhardt Motorsport ME (QAT) 56pts
Drivers
1 7 Abdulaziz Al-Faisal KSA 140
2 3 Clemens Schmid AUT 128
3 2 Karim Al Azhari UAE 117
4 4 Zaid Ashkanani KUW 98
5 17 Faisal Binladen KSA 85
PaddockTalk Perspective
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