McLaren GT’s Factory is showering praise all over its driver Alvaro Parente, after he scored a double top-ten finish in Canada over the weekend.
Driving the K-PAX Racing 650S GT3 at the Pirelli World Challenge double-header at the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, these results keep the Portuguese driver in the forefront of the entire championship.
Those who are keeping tabs on the race will see Parente’s top ten performance as a strike out for pole position in the next round of the competition.
Meanwhile in Europe… Come Ledogar, fellow Factory Driver for McLaren, actually secured pole position and a podium finish on his championship debut.
Again, Ledogar was behind the wheel of another 650S GT3 at the second round of this year’s International GT Open at Spa Francorchamps.
Parente had rejoined customer team K-PAX Racing and it was with it that he continued his title challenge in the eighth and ninth races of the Pirelli season.
He took to the historic 3.9 km circuit in Ontario, which is famous for being extremely difficult to overtake on – so it’s no mean feat that Parente finished in the top ten.
Overall, he qualified in position eight in the #9 McLaren 650S GT3 and managed to maintain this position in Race 1.
It was in Race 2 that he ran ahead of the pack, thanks to a disastrous start for most as a result of the wet asphalt on the course. Parente took advantage of this and an incident that involved several other cars at the head of the field.
Two of these cars in particular were damaged beyond repair, which saw Parente climb up to position six and stay there as he crossed the line.
At Spa, Ledogar – along with driving partner Alexander West – secured silverware on his debut in this European series.
The pair started off in position 11, but made strong progress through the field, moving up to position six after sharp and committed overtakes.
Finishing in sixth position at the end of the race, Ledogar also managed to set a pole position laptime of 2m 17.073s.
However, it was Michael Benham and Duncan Tappy in the #59 650S GT3 that would take the most impressive result home for McLaren, finishing in second place at the GT Open in Spa.
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