The Bahrain International Circuit may have gone quiet and most of the drivers gone home, but one man could be seen driving his bicycle around the track well into the night.
The Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Middle East Championship starts in Bahrain on Friday, and Al Nabooda Racing’s new Swiss driver, Jeffrey Schmidt, is checking out a track he has become very familiar with in recent years.
“In Europe I use my bike quite a lot,” Schmidt, 21, said. “We spend a lot of time at the tracks so I thought, OK, I’ll take my bike. I use it to learn more about the track because in the car you sometime miss small holes and other things.
“So I brought my bike with me and I will leave down here for the whole season. I use it for one or two hours in the evening after a session.”
Schmidt joined Al Nabooda after spending the past two seasons with the Lechner Racing Team, previously racing in the European season’s Porsche Super Cup and the Porsche Carerra Cup, and he is confident his experiences on that continent will lead to success in the Middle East.
“I’m quite prepared because in Europe we have the same car so already I have a lot of mileage in it,” he said. “We had two days of testing here in Bahrain and it went quite well. We were always at the front with the top guys.
“Our work is done and we are excited for next week.”
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Schmidt, who will partner Zaid Ashkanani, believes he came across Al Nabooda’s radar in fortuitous circumstances.
“I was testing some cars for some guys, and I was coach for some drivers,” he said. “Then in one race two years ago there was a driver who couldn’t take part so I drove and won in Qatar by five seconds. That’s when they first paid attention to me and this year Al Nabooda directly asked me some weeks ago.
“For sure, I said yes, it’s always nice to be in a new championship, to drive for the best team in a championship, a new experience.” Between races, Schmidt will be returning home were he continues to study and runs his own company.
The European and Middle East seasons are ideally aligned for him to compete in both.
“The season here starts in November and ends in March and the season in Europe will start in April or May, so it’s perfect time,” he said. “Sure we’ll race again in Europe, it’s the heart of racing.”
By then he will hope to have wrapped up a championship with Al Nabooda, and after Bahrain all his attention will be on the next race.
“The next race will be in Saudi Arabia, in Reem,” Schmidt said. “I don’t know this track because I did not drive there in the last two years. It’s new for me but we have 10 days there so that’s enough time to learn the track for me, so no problem with that.”
akhaled@thenational.ae
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