Summarize

Jurie ‘Umpie’ Swart enjoyed another great weekend’s racing at Port Elizabeth’s Volkswagen Extreme Festival Raceday, ending second overall in the ultra competitive Falken Polo Cup following a couple of thirds and a second in the three races. Swart’s form comes on the back of his first Polo Cup win aboard his Alpine Autohaus GAP Motorsport Polo at home at Killarney last time out, to move him up to third in the championship halfway through the 2019 chase.

“I was delighted to keep our momentum going after my first win at home at Killarney last time out — second for the day is a great reward for my team and me,” Cape Town driver Umpie explained. “The weekend started well — I was second in all three of Friday’s practice sessions and my race pace looked very good.

“We qualified in windy conditions and I was not able to get the most out of my car, but we made it through to Superpole and I had a decent lap there to qualify third. “Race 1 started well and I had a good launch to move into second, but I cooked my tyres and brakes trying to stay with Brad Liebenberg, which allowed Jeff Kruger to catch and take me with a last lap push to pass, but third was good.

“Heat 2 was much the same story — I had another good start to run third and managed to pass Clinton Bezuidenhout on lap 4 or so, but I worked the rubber too hard again and that allowed Matt Shorter to get by, but I managed to hold Jeff back for third again. “My consistent qualifying laps saw me second on the final grid and I had another great launch to lead the first 4 laps, but Brad just had the edge and he managed to pass me.

“I hung on to him, but he had a push to pass left and got away, so then I just focussed on keeping the gap to Jeff to get second for the day. “We learnt a lot with the setup of my car today, especially after watching how Brad's car handles in the last race 3 and we look forward to finding that last bit of pace for the rest of the season.”

Jurie races at Killarney next in round 5 of the WP Burly Pro GTi Challenge 6 July, where he aims to make good after a difficult last two rounds, before heading to Zwartkops for the next Polo Cup round end July. “We have a little work to do in our home series and then it’s all eyes on Zwartkops. “Thanks so much to my team - my dad, Zak and Andrew of GAP Motorsport - it’s great for our little Cape Town team to be running as well as we are against the big teams from Jo’burg!"