Team Pakistan finished 14th in both the Sprint and Feature races of the A1GP fourth round at the Zhuhai International Circuit in China.
The Zhuhai round provided some action packed racing, as Pakistan raced for glory and after a difficult qualifying session on Saturday, Pakistan’s Adam Khan made up several places to finish 14th in both the races.
As the lights went out for A1GP’s first Sprint race at the Zhuhai International Circuit, Khan made a good start, diving down the outside as the 22 cars hurtled towards the first corner. Filing around the first corner in safety, an incident at the back of the field on the second corner resulted in a group of cars crashing. Picking his way carefully around the unfolding melee without losing position, Khan emerged in 15th place.
As many more experience drivers clashed and suffered the consequences, Khan kept the Pakistan car on track and by lap 11 was up to 14th, the position he would take at the chequered flag. After a colourful opening ceremony watched by an enthusiastic local crowd, the 22 A1GP cars took their positions for the 70-minute Feature race.
Featuring a standing start, Khan made a stunning start, passing the cars of the Czech Republic and Lebanon. However, as the cars thundered towards the tight first corner, Khan was left with no where to go, was forced onto the grass and was hit by another car.
With a missing front wing and severe damage to the bodywork, Khan limped back to the pits for a new nose cone and front wing. Emerging from the pits in 18th place and in spite of the team’s earlier problems, Khan continued to race hard, passing the Portuguese car in a great move at the first corner on lap 6. As various teams crashed off track, Khan kept pushing, and was up to 14th by lap 23.
The team made their second mandatory pit stop on lap 32, and emerged in 14th with 13 laps to go. Driving a solitary race from there to the end, Khan maintained his position to cross the finish line.
Meanwhile, India’s Narain Karthikeyan created history by winning the A1GP race at Zhuhai. His win made him the first Indian to ever win an A1GP race. Starting from a very strong qualifying at third place, Karthikeyan drove at a fantastic pace and Team India had two very efficient pit stops.
Karthikeyan, who started from third on the grid, took the lead from New Zealand during the second pit stop window on lap 29 and, in spite of a huge amount of pressure and some good racing from Reid, Narain held off the Black Beauty (Team New Zealand) and went on to fly past the chequered flag in first place. Karthikeyan recorded his fastest lap in 1:25.183 seconds on lap 28 with a top speed of 262.8 kph.
 “This has come as a much deserved victory for the team and is good for my confidence,” said Narain. “The team has been working really hard at pit stop practices and they’ve done a really good job this weekend.
 “We had excellent pit stops that really paid off and contributed to our victory. It is early in the season and we have already secured points and now have a win. I look forward to racing the rest of the season and bringing home more victories,” added Narain.
India had a good start to Raceday, picking up two places and finishing the Sprint race in 7th place. For the record, Team Germany won the Sprint race. Team India now has 27 points and stands 10th of 22 competing nations. The next race, the fifth of the season, is at Taupo, New Zealand next month.