Star Mild takes top honors at drag race

Star Mild takes top honors at drag race

JAKARTA (JP): The Star Mild team finished on top in the eighth
and final round of the national drag race at Sentul, near Bogor,
on the weekend.

The members of the winning team were Robert J. Paul of Canada
and local drivers Donnie Pangemanan and Ronny Hermawan.

Paul took first place with 105 points, followed by Donnie with
69 points and Ronny also with 69 points. The Star Mild team also
won in Bali (Sept. 2) and Manado (Sept. 6).

After three qualifying rounds, six of the 29 drivers were
eligible for the final leg of the race.

Paul, driving a BMW M3, clocked the equal fastest time of
11.875 seconds during qualifying but a five second penalty was
added because he jumped the start.

He had to be satisfied with sixth place and a time of 16.953
seconds.

First place went to Wie Wie Rianto (Holden) clocking 11.875,
Ronny (Ford RS200) second with 12.579, Donny (VW Beatle) third
with 12.713, Felix (VW Beatle) fourth with 13.205 and Iwan Lemes
(VW Beatle) fifth with 13.421.

"There's no way that I deliberately jumped the start. I felt
my front tires rotating and my sights were set on the light as it
turned from red to green. I really regret this incident," Paul
said.

About 350 drivers took part in the final leg which started at
5 p.m. Saturday and finished at 3:30 a.m. yesterday. Thousands of
people watched the race including Tinton Soeprapto, the circuit's
director.

Up until the sixth leg of the race, Paul was on 99 points,
Donnie 57 points and Ronny 54 points.

Wie Wie won the sixth leg, leaving Paul and Ronny in second
and third place respectively.

The seventh leg, held in Yogyakarta, was stopped because the
spectators were too close to the track. None of the racers were
given points for that leg.

Paul moved from sixth to first place yesterday with an
additional six points, giving him a total of 105. Donnie and
Ronnie scored another 12 and 15 points respectively, giving them
69 a piece. (lnt)