TF Sport retired from the Bapco 8 Hours of Bahrain due to a broken fuel rail, the team has revealed.
The British squad had hopes of a podium finish until Charlie Eastwood experienced mechanical issues behind the wheel of the #90 Aston Martin Vantage AMR. The team then discovered one of the fuel rails on the car had broken, and ultimately retired after attempting to return to the track with Jonny Adam behind the wheel.
Tom Ferrier, TF Sport Director, explained the team chose to retire because it wanted to avoid putting Adam in danger and causing more damage to the car.
“Fuel rail issue on the engine, we couldn’t change it during the final two hours left to race,” said Ferrier. “We tried to get back out to finish and get classified, but it was too bad by the end. We couldn’t run it without doing more damage to the car and putting Jonny in danger.
It’s a shame, it’s a sad way to end what otherwise has been a fantastic year. We’re still fourth in the championship – not the end of the world as we’re halfway through the season and we know we can win – we’ve done it twice. Lets’ crack on again next year!”
The retirement meant an unfortunate end to strong first half of the season for the team during which Adam, Eastwood and Salih Yoluc took back-to-back wins in Fuji and Shanghai. The team ends the year fourth in the standings behind Team Project 1, AF Corse and Aston Martin Racing.
“It was a difficult race for us, obviously with the 45 kilos it was always going to be difficult regardless but unfortunately in my second stint I started to struggle shifting up through the gears and it turned out that the fuel rail was the problem, starving the engine,” added Eastwood, who was driving when the failure occured.
“Gradually it got worse throughout the race and unfortunately, we had to retire. It’s not the result that we wanted to finish off a pretty perfect 2019 but we’re still in the hunt for the championship. On the bright side it means less ballast going into COTA.”
