Misano, Italy – Oman’s Al Faisal Al Zubair teamed up with Italy’s David Fuminelli to finish sixth (fifth in Pro class) and seventh overall on his return to top flight racing in the two International GT Open races at the Misano World Circuit in Italy.

The Al Manar by Dragon Racing duo qualified fifth and 10th for the two races in the Pro class, finishing race one in a similar position and improving to finish seventh in race two in their Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO run by Dubai-based Dragon Racing.

A last lap victory in race one went to the Elite Motorsport Ferrari duo of Tom Emson and Tom Lebbon and they also topped the standings in race two.

Al Zubair said: “It was good to be back after five months out of the car. I haven’t been away for this long since I started racing. Having only two practice sessions before going into the weekend was definitely not the easiest. We finished P7 on Saturday with a 10-second handicap but, unfortunately, qualified P17 on Sunday. We made it to seventh overall in the end and that was pretty positive for our return to racing.

“To be in the top 10 for both races, we can take the positives out of it. We struggled with the car quite a bit if we are honest and need to work hard to find the issues before the next race. My team-mate was great and we had a very positive partnership. It’s a difficult and technical circuit but we have had podiums here before. We need to figure out what we were lacking from the set-up this weekend.”

Twenty-nine teams were entered across the Pro, ProAm and Amateur categories with Al-Manar by Dragon Racing facing nine rivals in the Pro class. They included the GetSpeed and Team Motopark Mercedes’, AF Corse Ferraris and the ZRS Motorsport Porsche.

Al Zubair and Fuminelli made a strong start to their new partnership in the first of two free practice sessions on Friday. They ran for 29 laps and carded a quickest tour of 1min 34.478sec that put them fifth in the rankings (third Pro class). Emson and Lebbon topped the Pro times with a run of 1min 34.417sec.

Zac Meakin and Dean MacDonald ran quickest in Pro free practice two with a run of 1min 33.416sec in their Greystone GT McLaren. The Al-Manar by Dragon Racing duo were fifth of the Pro runners with a best lap of 1min 33.839sec heading into the first of the qualifying sessions on Saturday morning.

Fuminelli took the helm of the Ferrari for Q1 and his 12th lap was the quickest, stopping the clocks in 1min 32.229sec. That put the Al-Manar by Dragon Ferrari in fifth of the Pro runners with pole position falling to MacDonald in the McLaren.

The Italian settled into fifth in the Pro category through the opening laps of the first 70-minute race with MacDonald setting the early pace. After 15 laps, Fuminelli continued to hold fifth and tried to close in on Alex Fontana in the ZRS Motorsport Porsche.

Driver changes affected the leader board after the half-hour mark and Al Zubair made a late changeover in the Al-Manar by Dragon Ferrari and held fourth in the Pro class at the start of his stint with less than 29 minutes remaining. The Omani eventually finished sixth overall (fifth in Pro) after a yellow flag stoppage.

Al Zubair qualified the Ferrari for the second race and his fastest run came on lap 10. A tour of 1min 32.898sec put the Al-Manar car in 10th amongst the Pro runners and 17th on the full grid of 27 cars. It meant that Omani had it all to do at the start of the second one-hour race.

High track temperatures were a feature of the entire weekend, as Al Zubair gained three places in the overall and one place in Pro through the opening lap. By the end of lap two, the Al-Manar Racing driver was up to 12th and seventh in the Pro class.

He retained 12th into the driver changeover period and pitted early for Fuminelli to take over for the remaining 33 minutes of the race. The Italian held seventh overall when all the driver changes were completed with less than 22 minutes on the clock. He held that position to the finish to give Al Zubair a confidence-boosting return to GT racing after injury.

The Al Manar by Dragon Racing duo return to action at the Paul Ricard circuit in France on July 17th-19th.