Kirchmayr secures Coppa Shell World Final trophy

The Austrian again kept his cool under pressure as the scheduled 30-minute race was interrupted three times by the safety car, but Kirchmayr ran home the winner by half-a-second in a minute-and-a-half dash to the chequered flag as the lights turned green for the final time.

The prestigious World Final race saw all the Ferrari Challenge contenders from the various regions get together for a one-off dash for the trophy, after the conclusion of their relative championships on Saturday.

Second place went to American Todd Coleman, who was unable to add to his personal double-win tally from the Friday and Saturday races, the Ferrari of Denver man making a couple of brave attempts to squeeze past Kirchmayr on the outside of San Donato on the restarts, and he then had to hold off a late charge from Manny Franco (Ferrari Lake Forest) in the final stages.

The final podium place deservedly went to Franco, who had been impressive all weekend with the number of overtaking moves he has made, and he continued his positive run in this race by moving up from ninth to third after not figuring in the early stages.

Fons Scheltema (Kessel Racing) was fourth on the grid and he finished fourth at the flag after losing out to Franco, while Giuseppe Ramelli (Rossocorsa-Pellin Racing) started ahead of him but was one of the first to retire when he ended up in the gravel on the opening lap.

Peter Christensen (Formula Racing) drove a great race to clinch the AM class in fifth place, often getting in amongst the leading group, and he was followed home by two more AM drivers, Joakim Olander (Scuderia Autoropa) and Josef Schumacher (Eberlein Automobile), who stepped up for the final podium places in this particular category.

Once again Park Jae Sung (FM Korea) was the top man home in the Asia Pacific grouping, the Korean finishing eleventh overall, a couple of places ahead of Kirk Baerwaldt (Blackbird Concessionaires).