Team STARD wins Head-to-Head Extreme H competition in Saudi Arabia

Team STARD’s Patrick O’Donovan and Amanda Sorensen rebounded from a difficult first day at the FIA Extreme H World Cup to win the Head-to-Head competition on Friday.

After being held back by inverter issues during Thursday's Time Trial competition – a side-by-side contest on a a 532-meter course, starting with a steep drop, then following by a chicane, two jumps and a flying finish with each of the team's two drivers alternating which runs they drove in – O'Donovan and Sorensen won three out of their four heats. The team's only Heat loss came to Jameel Motorsport's Kevin Hansen and Molly Taylor, whom they would meet again in the Final. They also disposed of JBX's Tommi Hallman and Christine GZ in the Semifinals.

Jameel, meanwhile, went unbeaten in the lead up to the Final, defeating JBX, ZEROID Motorsport (Fraser McConnell and Gray Leadbetter) and Team KMS (Johan Kristoffersson and Mikaela Ahlin-Kottulinsky) in addition to STARD in the Heats, then Carl Cox Motorsport's Timo Scheider and Klara Andersson in the semis.

In the Final, Sorensen got off the line better than Taylor, but the Australian made up time at the chicane. The race continued with the two on an even footing, Sorensen just edging it by 0.082s.

Despite losing out on the Head-to-Head medals, Jameel claimed the most World Cup qualifying points on Friday thanks to the two bonus points it got for setting the combined best time of both of its drivers from the day.

The haul moves the Jameel to the top of the World Cup qualifying points standings, which will decide the grid for Saturday's eight-car World Cup Final race. Team Hansen, which won the last-ever Extreme E race last Sunday currently occupies the second spot, while Time Trial winners Team KMS slipped to third after a dismal Head-to-Head display where it only won one Heat and failed to advance to the knockout rounds.

The FIA Extreme H World Cup concludes on Saturday with a multi-car racing element – four four-car Heat races, and an eight-car World Cup Final race which will crown the overall winner of the event.

Topics

fia extreme h world cup

team stard

jameel motorsport

team kms

kevin hansen

molly taylor

fraser mcconnell

amanda sorensen

jaxon taylor

time trial

Off-Road

Extreme H

Dominik Wilde

Dominik often jokes that he was born in the wrong country – a lover of NASCAR and IndyCar, he covered both in a past life as a junior at Autosport in the UK, but he’s spent most of his career to date covering the sliding and flying antics of the U.S.’ interpretation of rallycross. Rather fitting for a man that says he likes “seeing cars do what they’re not supposed to do”, previously worked for a car stunt show, and once even rolled a rally car with Travis Pastrana. He was also comprehensively beaten in a kart race by Sebastien Loeb once, but who hasn’t been?

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