Ombra Racing will be on the Auto GP grid
Ombra Racing is the latest addition to the entry list for the Auto GP maiden season. So, after the French team DAMS and the Brits of SuperNova, the series organized by Coloni Motorsport hails the arrival of an Italian outfit, a young team which has everything it’s needed to fight with the “big boys”.
Born in 2002, Ombra Racing was an outright winner, clinching two titles in a row in the Italian F.Junior and then graduating to F.3. In the Italian F.3 Championship, the team won its first race in the debut year and took the championship in 2004, its second year in the series. This victories gained Ombra a lot of respect, something that in the following years led to important partnerships with some of the best teams in motorsport, like Carlin Motorsport for A1 GP and Threebond for the 2005 Macau Grand Prix.
From 2006 on, the team raced in the German F.3 championship, the ATS F3 Cup, clinching really good results. Thanks to this, the palmarés of Ombra Racing is pretty impressive for such a young team: 20 wins, 32 podiums and 13 pole positions.
The reasons for this success, besides a well blendend and hard working group, are found in the experience and the knowledge of the men in charge of the team: Massimo Pollini, the Technical Director, is working on single seaters from 1980 and throughout his career he managed to work in F.1, with the Fondmetal team; from 1992 he has been Technical Director for lots of different outfits, in Italy and abroad, and he works with Ombra Racing for the team’s very first days.
Besides him, Davide Mazzoleni is the living soul of the team: he is one of its co-founders, and until 2004 he was even one of its drivers, in F.3. These days he uses his experience to help the young talents fielded by Ombra, working as an on-track technician.
Enzo Coloni: “I’m really happy to welcome Ombra Racing to Auto GP. After DAMS and SuperNova, we are really pleased of having on our grid an Italian team which was able to gain so much respect in the European scenario in so few years of activity, racing also in the most known international events like the Masters of Zandvoort and the Macau Grand Prix. The entry of another team is the best way for us to start the new year, and we are preparing for other big announcements”.
Massimo Pollini: “As the Auto GP project was presented we immediately thought it was interesting, and not only because of the huge prize money: the main reason for our interest can be found in the great technical package it provides and in the team selection process based on quality. We believe that racing against teams coming from GP2 can add some prestige to our activity, and we’re happy about that. Obvioulsy it’s a challenge but we’re used to that, challenges are part of our history”.
source: autogp.org