Lirim Zendeli made a one-off appearance in a Porsche Carrera Cup Brasil endurance race at a scorching Autódromo Internacional do Algarve circuit in Portugal over the weekend, finishing an overall sixth in partnership with Pedro Boesel.

Invited to take part in the PCCB race through a racing acquaintance, Zendeli was sharing the driving duties in the 300 Km do Algarve, the fifth round of the Brasilian Porsche one-make series, in a Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car similar to the one he is racing with in this current season. It was the first time the German-born Albanian had ever raced at the spectacular 4.653 km circuit on the outskirts of Portimão.

In Saturday afternoon’s first free practice session for the Carrera Cup class the duo of Boesel/Zendeli, in the class’s top division, showed they meant business, ending up with the quickest time of 1m46.150s.

Five Carrera Cup Sprint cars came between them in Qualifying and Boesel and Zendeli’s time of 1m47.778s meant that they would start from a P10 grid position on row 5 in the #88 Porsche. Once the two-and-a-half-hour race started however they soon found themselves moving up back into an overall top six position.
Even after the three mandatory six-minute pitstops for the driver changes, the pace of the Brasilian-German duo never flagged, and they took the chequered flag in sixth place as the experienced Marçal Müller and Felipe Fraga ran home as winners.

Zendeli now returns to Italy for the third round of the Porsche Carrera Cup Italia this weekend, when he will be racing a BeDriver-entered Porsche in the one-make series at the Autodromo di Mugello in Tuscany.