Rivera cops Asian kart second place

SENTUL, West Java—Fern-C Racing’s Estefano Rivera uncorked an astounding show to emerge the top Filipino finisher and capture the Overall Junior Karter Runner-Up plum recently in the championship leg of the 2012 Asian Karting Open Championship held at Sentul International Circuit here in Indonesia.

The 15-year-old Rivera, a Don Bosco-Makati junior high student, copped third place in Round 4 despite the superb teamwork of the powerhouse Indonesians and wrapped up the season with a huge victory in the Formula 125 Open Juniors class for the country in the championship leg the following day.

Trailing by as many as 27 points prior to this Indonesian stint, Rivera wound up his campaign with a total of 152 points for the Asian Junior runner-up crown, 10 points behind Asian Karting Junior champ Darma Mangkuluhur of Indonesia.

His older brother Milo Rivera, a Don Bosco-Makati high school senior, bagged the overall fourth runner-up honors in the premiere Formula 125 Open Seniors division.

Problems beset the Rivera brothers upon arrival Wednesday dawn as their equipment got misplaced by their airline and was recovered only late night the same day, forcing them to miss two days of practice as the team led by by Fern-C head coach Edgen Dy-Liacco and chief mechanic Rommuel Salazar had to work on the set-up of the karts Thursday morning.

Moreover, missing two days of practice denied the Fern-C Racing Team enough time to make necessary adjustments, particularly racing with a tougher track condition under the perennial heavy afternoon showers.

Estefano completed 18 laps of racing in 16 minutes and 1.736 seconds or 3.951 seconds ahead of another ace Indonesian Aria Bima with Singaporean Jon Lee Xuanhao claiming third place.