Lirim Zendeli (BeDriver) took his Porsche 911 GT3 Cup to seventh place in the second race of the Porsche Carrera Cup Italia weekend at the Vallelunga circuit near Rome.

Starting from eighth place on the grid, MIM-contracted Zendeli had a slight issue with the clutch at the start but managed to get away well anyway and he was then involved in a race-long battle for P7 sandwiched between Francesco Braschi (Ombra Racing) and Diego Bertonelli (The Driving Experiences).

Lirim put Braschi under pressure in the final stages and nipped through into seventh when his rival made a mistake on the penultimate lap.

“At the start, I had a very good reaction. I think the best reaction out there, but the car bogged down,” declared Lirim. “When I approached my grid position, I thought I was in neutral so I came off the clutch and stalled, and then I had to turn it on again. And then the clutch got kind of stuck, so I had to brake and wait. And the moment I released the brakes and the clutch it bogged down. I didn’t lose any place, but I think maybe I could have made up one or two positions more. “

“Braschi made a mistake one lap before the end. He locked up his front in 4 and again in 7, so his front right was pretty much dead. And the next lap, I just showed myself a bit like I’m dive bombing, but I just kept myself back. He just hit the brakes harder at that point, locked the front right again and went straight into turn 8. It’s always Braschi and me but it’s a lot of fun racing with him! Bertonelli was also fast, not fast enough to overtake me, but fast enough at the beginning to catch up. I think his tyres were dead by the end of the race, while I still had some left in my tyres.”

The German-Albanian, who added the P7 to his P9 in yesterday’s opening encounter, was exhausted after another tough race on the difficult Vallelunga track held in scorching hot weather conditions but was satisfied with his pace on his return to racing for the first time since last year.

“A pity about the qualifying, because it was all because of the traffic, but I’m exhausted after that race. I’ve been working in the gym a lot in the last month, because I wanted to pick up the game again, and it helped me because, honestly, in the second race, I was feeling the effects!”