WORLD SPORTS NETWORK

PREDATOR RACING GROUP DRIVER INES SANTA ANA'S SHOCK REVELATION: "I'M BURNT OUT"

It Seems that Ines Santa Ana's life of non-stop parting was finally caught up with her, after confessing in a radio interview that she's "burnt out, and in need of some detox time."

"I've been enjoying my self its true..." said the young 24 year old driver, her words tangled with an air of regret. "I had a great time, but its all starting to catch up with me now."

When asked weather or not she regretted her time hitting the clubs, Santa Ana was defiant: "It was what I wanted to do with my life. just me being me. I'm feeling different now, and that's that. Its time to focus on my racing again."     

THE EVENING HERALD 

LOCAL FUN RUN GRACED BY EUROPEAN RACING SERIES STAR SOFI SEVILLA!

Predator racing group driver Sofi Sevilla has added a bit of star quality to a local fun run by participating in a race near her home town in Spain.

Locals where thrilled with the drivers appearance. One man told us: " I turn to the wife and said blooming hack thats Sofi Sevilla! I cant believe my eyes."    

Much to her disappointment, the European Racing Series driver did not manage to finish well and had to settle for a free medal and an energy drink.

Race Weekend - Tondela GP ERS Season 1

 

 



Predator Racing Group Blog

                                                        By Bob Power

Thursday

Tondela is here for race #4! For this past month we worked hard on our brake package with a hole new design for both cars (32) (32) . The feed back was positive from Bishop and Dunbar so they went ahead and installed them for the weekend. hopefully with the new design this will solve are breaking problems.
  
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Friday - Practice 

Morning final practice kicked off great with the new brakes design. Sevilla was able to hit a time of 1:24.274 to lock in 11th in practice but it was another story for Santa Ana she could only manage 1:27.588 she kept hitting traffic in all the wrong places.

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Race Day

As the rules states reversed driver points position grid Santa Ana will start 2nd and Sevilla will start 6th.

When the green flag dropped, we got a great start going into turn 1 as Santa Ana shot out to take the lead and Sevilla was able to steal 5th away.

 

Lap 2 saw a lot of action a mid pack car got loose and every one had to check up resulting in a lot of flat spot tires. Aurelie Dembele wasn't so lucky as he would slam into Bao Tang's car and both had to pit for wing damage. As all this was happening Santa Ana was extending her lead.

lap 3 saw Sofi Sevilla lock up and a call from Bishop made her pit early for softs.

by lap 4 Dreyfuss started to real in Santa Ana as tire ware started to show on this hot day. With that Ana was screaming over the radio at Dunbar and pitted for softs at lap 5. she would come out 8th after her stop.

After the first pit cycle at lap 8 Santa Ana was 5th, Sevilla was 6th.

Next round of pit stops would be around lap 14. Bishop and Dunbar both messed up Santa Ana and Sevilla stop, they both had fueling problems with both cars.

Last round of stops came around lap 22 with 10 to go Santa Ana would come out 9th after her stop and Sevilla would come out 12th.

Sevilla would catch up to Santa Ana and they both would battle it out to the finish going back and forth with each other with Santa Ana coming home to 11th and Sevilla 12th

Jha would win at Tondela, with Melo 2nd, and Cavalcanti 3rd.

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Race run down

Overall it wasnt what I was expecting we had at least a 8th / 9th place cars, but that's what you say "that's racen"on to Ardennes!

The GMA issued another post race penalty

Archer BMR - Driver Mustafa El Sanat - Failed post race inspection  -2 spots

After 4 races we sit in the drivers championship

Sofi Sevilla - 13th - 35 points
Ines Santa Ana - 18th - 25 points

In the team standings we sit 8th over all with 60 points

Race Weekend - Milan GP ERS Season 1 

Predator Racing Group Blog

                                                        By Bob Power

Thursday

Race Three is here! Milan is the track this time and just like Isai Nolde promised we have not one but two brand new engines to try out. the first engine we have is a in house built motor at (35) and Sofi Sevilla has that one. The other is a outsource motor pushing (60) and Ines Santa Ana has that one.

We also have Sponsor Jander Mole Media with us here this weekend, so we really need a good showing for them.
  
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Friday - Practice 

Afternoon practice our goal was to break in the new motors and to fix any problems that had arrived. We got some good notes on soft tires but only manage 17th with Sevilla and 18th with Santa Ana. 

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Race Day

As the rules states reversed driver points position grid Santa Ana will start 3rd and Sevilla will start 4th.

It turned out to be a beautiful day for racing with an average temp of 66 degrees. The new motors have been broken in and where just about to take the green.

 

At the start, Santa Ana and Sevilla have a hard fought battle for 3rd. This wound up as a heated battle back and forth for 3 laps intill Santa Ana got major loose and fell to 10th.

 

Sergio Valdes ending up losing his motor going down the back stretch at the start of lap 5. The GMA was slow to throw the caution and Tanvir Jha got into his oil trail and crashed hard into the wall. Yellows out!

 

Sevilla was just passed pit lane when the yellow came out, but Santa Ana made it in and she wound up last on the grid for making hole sale changes to her car. Then it was Sevilla turn to pit and the crew realized they put the rear tires up front but caught it in time before she went back out, but would end up next to Santa Ana coming to the green.

 

The green flag was back out and Vaananen leads and got a big jump on the field till the next round of green flag stops.

 

lap 17 saw the last stops as Sevilla climbed to 12th and Santa Ana 15th

 

The Checkered flew on lap 21 as Beauchamp took the win, Arbeloa 2nd, and Antonov 3rd. We ended up clawing are way up to 9th with Sevilla but Santa Ana stayed in 15th

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Race run down

It was an ok day for us, the early yellow hurt us but manage to salvage a decent finish. We got some good notes with the new engines and look forward to Tondela next.

The GMA was harsh this week with inspections and handed down some hefty penalty's to teams.

ZRT Autosport - Driver Aurelie Dambele lost 2 spots - unapproved wing adjustments
ZRT Autosport - Driver Sergio Valdes lost 4 spots - unapproved engine 
Octane Racing - Driver Luigi Marchetta lost 2 spots - unapproved brakes  
Silva Racing - Driver Eduardo Melo lost 6 spots - unapproved engine and gearbox 

After the penalty's Sevilla moved up the 7th over all, but Santa Ana stayed at 15th.
 

WORLD SPORTS NETWORK

WILL THE ERS BE ADDING A NEW RACE IN RIO DE JANEIRO NEXT SEASON?

A vote at the GMA on Wednesday will decide weather or not the European Racing Series roadshow will roll in to Brazil next year.

Judging by the circuit layout, the track in Rio De Janeiro is likely good news for ZRT autosport, whose car will likely to perform well there.

"Its always great to visit a new circuit," said ZRT engineer Peter O'Sullivan "I'd would like to watch our cars hurtling around the track there."

Race Weekend - Munich GP ERS Season 1 

Predator Racing Group Blog

                                                        By Bob Power

Thursday

Race number two is upon us! We just arrived here at Munich and just unloaded the cars, we cant be any more excited to be here and one of my favorite tracks to be at. 

For our goals for the weekend is to finish in the top 15 I think we can achieve this and will look good for our current sponsors.
  
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Friday - Practice 

Final afternoon practice was a very cool but sunny 55 degrees we manage to hit on a good setup with Sofi, but Santa ana never hit on a wing adjustment she liked during practice.  Isabel Bishop made some final adjustments to her car and hopefully she will like them.

Jean-Francois Beauchamp from Garuda Racing won the round with a time of 1:36.476

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Race Day

As the rules states reversed driver points position grid Santa Ana will start 3rd and Sevilla will start 4th.

We had a little weather in the morning of the race that lingered to the start with light rain. We opted to stay with softs as the track was not that wet. Vaananen lead early on and Santa Ana was able to hang on to 3rd till her first stop. Sevilla on the other hand got trapped behind a slower car and fell to 13th at the start.

On lap 6 Jean-Francois Beauchamp slamed into the back of Sergio Arbeloa when the track was a little damp and both had to pit early. No caution.

Soon after a wild ride for Eduardo Melo as he went head on into turn 12 tire wall. The track was still a little wet. Claen up had to be made from Melo car and to the tire wall. Yellows out!

It was a busy pit road, Santa Ana made a few adjustments to her car and drops to 9th, Sevilla had a vary bad stop and came out 15th as Sergio Valdes leads them to the green.

Not much excitement happen after that as the field got strung out as Santa Ana fought her way up to 5th with 10 to go as Sevilla got as high as 10th before the last stops and with heavy storms linger in the area.

With 5 to go we gained some with the weather as every one anticipated the storm but it rained later in the run as we switch to wets.

Last lap! Santa Ana got to carried away in 6th and lock them up big time resulting her tires to blow out and limping home to 16th. Sevilla on the other hand push her car a little to much and ran out of fuel coming to the line finishing 12th

Sergio Valdes take the win with El Sadat 2nd and Arbeloa 3rd

After the race the GMA handed out 5 penalty's to pit road violations to over aggressive driving resulting in a pass thru. Arbeloa,Chu,Sabado,Beauchamp,Jha

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Race run down

we had a really great race with Santa ana and Sevilla. We manage to fix the little gremlins that plagued us during the first race even tho the results didnt show for it. We definitely showed some muscle in this race and over all we completed our goals for the race weekend. On to Milan! 

Power Updates



So the last 26 days have been very busy here at Predator, Isai Nolde our lead designer has been working on our reliability problems. We have found out the problems with the breaks and have hoped we wont run into problems for the upcoming race at Munich GP. He also had some time to tune our current engines more. I also overheard him in a meeting with our engine builder for another motor. He did however said that the new motor that was built last month had no time spent into it, but was going to shoot for Milan GP and circle that on our calendar.


We also just signed Peach-Plum as our newest sponsor for 9 races. We are looking forward to have this partnership with them.

Race Weekend - Black Sea GP ERS Season 1

Predator Racing Group Blog

                                                        By Bob Power

Thursday

Race weekend is here! Its been a crazy few weeks for us with all the changes I have put into effect. we have built a new motor but wasn't done on time for race weekend Isai Nolde was working all night trying to complete it but he found some bugs with it and opted to not test our luck.

The forecast for the weekend looks like we wont see sun but fingers crossed we do. I'm not expecting a lot from our team as every one is new together. I told the team before we left to work on setups for next time have fun and just finish the race. We have 30 laps to log and our race mechanics say our tire wear will be very high and are brakes are weak so we will need to improve them for the next race.

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Friday - Practice 

Friday morning practice was very rainy. It poured from the time we hit the track to the very last second of practice there where spots here and there of sun but its was just a tease. 

We did unexpectedly well during practice. We might of been the slowest with intermediates but we where 6th with Sofi Sevilla with a time of 1.31.744 and 8th with Ines Santa Ana with a time of 1.32.933. It was a big booster to every one on the team even tho the rest of the field had wets on...

 Isabel Bishop was reporting that Sevilla found her grove right away with a setup balance at 97%

Roger Dunbar reported in that Santa Ana was comfortable with her car at a setup balance at 96%

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Race Day

As the rules states reversed driver points position grid Santa Ana will start 12th and Sevilla will start 2nd. hoping Sevilla wont get the first lap jitters.

we are playing it safe, Where not going to push no matter how tempting it will be, We need to save both cars for next week they are our only cars.. to our surprise the suns out (thanks weather man) and its a cool 55 degrees out.

Green Flags Out  (live race report)

Sevilla held strong to about midway down the track but just got fright trained and settled to 11th

Santa Ana has settled to about 17th headed onto lap two, Watching everyone in front of her locking there tires up!

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Lap 5

first round of pit stops are happening for the drivers that had locked up on lap 2 and 3.

Sevilla fell back to 15th
Santa Ana fell to 20th 
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Lap 8 

leader Jha on pit road now for softs.

Sevilla moved to 6th
Santa Ana moved to 13th

we have not pitted yet for tires Santa Ana starting to complain.

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Lap 9

Roger Dunbar just called Santa Ana to pit for super softs. He was saying over the radio "wanted to try something different.

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Lap 10

  

Isabel Bishop called Sevilla in liking the super softs idea.

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Lap 13 

after first round of pit stops are over. Jha is 1st) Arbeloa is 2nd) Gerard is 3rd)

Sevilla fell back to 17th one lap down.
Santa Ana fell to 20th one lap down.

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Lap 15 

2nd round of pit stops started waiting for everything to fan out.

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Lap 19

Sevilla just got slammed in the rear by Dreyfuss knocked the rear wing apart! Dreyfuss has a pass through penalty!

Sevilla just started to complain that her engine messed up going down the backstretch!

Sevilla forces to pit!

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Lap 20

last round of pit stops are starting Jha is 1st) Arbeloa is 2nd) Cavalcanti is 3rd)

Sevilla fell back to 20th one lap down.
Santa Ana fell to 19th one lap down.

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Lap 23 

both Sevilla and Santa Ana called in for final stop, They are far apart so crews can work on them ok.

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Lap 24

Santa Ana has just reported to Dunbar her brakes are just about done.

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Lap 27 

Jha is 1st) Cavalcanti is 2nd) Gerard is 3rd)

Santa Ana still hanging on.

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Lap 28 

Sevilla was just heard over the radio 3rd gear is gone.

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Lap 29

Jha is 1st) Cavalcanti is 2nd) Gerard is 3rd)

Sergio Valdes pulled into pits says "where done" (mechanical issues) was 7th.

Merja Vaananen just blew up down the backstretch.

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White Flag Out 

Beauchamp runs out just taking the white was 5th.

Gerard runs out at the final corner was 2nd.

Tanvir Jha runs out of fuel coming to the line but taken the checkered.

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Checkered Flag

Tanvir Jha Takes the win follow by Cavalcanti 2nd) and Gerard 3rd)

 
Sevilla rounded up to 18th 2 laps down.
Santa Ana came home to 17th 2 laps down.

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Race run down

Beside getting run over with Sevilla in her first race we did accomplish our goals for the weekend.

We did not get a DNF, Everyone finished and got seat time, And we got some valuable setup notes for next time out. On the plus side we did not finish last! On to the next race at Munich GP.

Silly Season Report Part 2

 MOTORSPORTIF
 By Michelle Dupont


As the days wine down where learning that the entire William Evans team have been let go at Predator Racing Group.

Reports are saying he was replaced with an untested rookie Sofi Sevilla and race machanic Isabel Bishop. The Spanish driver is a newcomer in the European Racing Series and Bob Power is hoping she can deliver quickly. Sevilla's contrat puts her along side as an equal with Ines Santa Ana with equipment. How will this turn out for the all female line up at Predator Racing Group?

Silly Season Report Part 1

XBC Sports
By Luke Finlay-Maxwell


Major shake ups at Predator Racing Group -- Just like Bob Power has said, It happen!
Tom Woodbridge is gone as Ines Santa Ana race mechanic and the replacement is new comer Roger Dunbar. 

Also another big change, Lead designer Charlotte Williams was fired and was reported to be "absolutely gutted" by this decision she will be replaced by Isai Nolde
 

Predator Racing Group Report

XBC Sports Interview

Higgins: We all know how much of a legend you are over in the states, Including a fan myself how did you become of this position?

Power: I known Darren luff for some time now and we have joked back and forth with his new start up team and how hard it would be to start from nothing in the European Racing Series.
At first I thought it was one of his jokes, but as he has talking to me he was dead set on doing this after what has gone down during preseason and in the end I said of course.

Higgins: Where still getting reports on what Kapoor did at Predator what is your take on it?

Power: Well Kapoor did a good job with the startup of the team his down fall was when Darren Luff caught him giving away team blueprints to ZRT Auto-sport.

Higgins: With only 16 days to the start of the season what do you plain to accomplish before we head into Black Sea and into the season?

Power: Well first I plain on doing major shake ups to the team. I never agreed with when Luff hired William Evens so as soon as I can find a replacement for him he will not be with us. I also plain on some personal changes as to I see fit Luff gave me the ability to fire and hire and I plain to do just that.

I also think that we can finnish 8th overall this season. After looking over the equipment and for what I have planed I'm going to talk over my ideas to our lead designer, But it will not be easy the first few races as Kapoor let things go this preseason.

PreSeason-Silly Season Report

Motor Racing MAGAZINE

BY Jiro Kagawa

 

 As silly season comes to a close for the start on the 2016 European Racing Series, We have reports of the firing of team principal R. Kapoor over at the Predator Racing Group. Rumor has it Ex-Modified Champion Bob Power from the USA will take over Kapoor duties, Effective immediately! With only 18 days left to the beginning of the season at Black Sea GP will this be a smart move for the young Predator Racing Group.