Allesandro Zanardi was quickest in the final practice session for the Blancpain Sprint Series finale in Baku, Azerbaijan; he went on to qualify thirteenth on the grid. His hand-controlled ROAL Motorsport Z4 GT3 was hit by a competitor’s car early in the first race. The damage took Zanardi out and rendered the car unrepairable for the main sprint.
The seventh and final event of the inaugural season of the Blancpain Sprint Series was run on the streets of Baku (go to eastern Turkey, drive across Armenia, then cross Azerbaijan and look for the capital city when you reach the shores of the Caspian Sea). The organizers also run the Blancpain Endurance Series. The sprint series runs a qualifying race and a main race each weekend.
The legendary Zanardi, who lost his legs in a CART race at the Lausitzring in 2001, returned to racing two years later, running a BMW 320i for Roberto Ravaglia’s team. He went on to win four World Touring Car Championship races for BMW, retiring in 2009. By then he had begun handbike racing: he won gold medals in the 2012 Paralympics.
He returned to Ravaglia’s ROAL Motorsport team to race a specially-built hand controlled Z4 in the Blancpain Sprint Series 2014 season. His best finish of the year was fifth overall in the main race at Brands Hatch.
He ran six of the seven race weekends, missing Zandvoort because of a prior commitment to a handbike event.
BMW’s best finish of the season was a win by Thomas Jäger and Dominik Baumann in a BMW Trophy Team Schubert Z4 GT3 at the Slovakia Ring in August. The series’ 2014 champion is Mercedes racer Maximilian Götz. The best BMW finishers at Baku were Ricardo and Rodrigo Sperafico in a BMW Sports Trophy Team Brazil Z4 GT3, who came in tenth in the qualifying race and ninth in the main race.—Brian S. Morgan
