Hurrah! At last!
(It was originally to be a 3-race exit but there were problems getting everything sorted for the last race, hence it's taken 4 races).
My Fisichella-orientated forum (
here, for anyone curious) has been absolute tumbleweed since Risi paused their involvement. The situation has been ridiculous - Fisico is on a 5-race DNF streak* (across the three series he's done in that time), which is 9 if we are counting the withdrawals, and none of them have been his fault. And I finally met him after 5 years of trying to do so the race before that chain of non-finishes started, so was worried I'd jinxed him
Fisico, please finish this race. By this point I don't even care what position...
* - For those unaware, here is the DNF streak in all its "glory":
IMSA Long Beach: Toni Vilander (Fisico's team-mate in IMSA) started, and collided with both Fords at the first corner. End of race.
IMSA COTA: Fisico started, led his class for half a lap... ...and then was clouted by the #66 Ford. The Ford got the blame, neither got any further in the race, the Risi was a write-off and a heavily-damaged Corvette helped nobody's mood. Risi set the team to fixing the car and arranged a lease to cover Le Mans (and, it appears, covering for the original car until it was fixed).
24 Hours of Le Mans: Pierre Kaffer (the driver Fisico and Toni Vilander teamed up with for this race) got struck by a clueless LMP2 car, writing off the leased chassis. The crash was bad enough that the entire front end was wiped off the leased car. Risi, now having no car and (for some reason) no insurance money to get yet another replacement, declared it would skip the next 3 races. You can't finish races you don't even start.
- Blancpain 6 Hours of Paul Ricard: Engine failure in the 4th hour, while fighting for a podium position.
- Blancpain 24 Hours of Spa: Marco Cioci (one of Fisico's team-mates) was clouted by a possibly-fatigued Raffaele Marciello on the 15th hour, while they were fighting for the lead. Raffaele was the most embarrassed podium-finisher I've ever seen in sportscars, Marco (and therefore Fisico) was out on the spot.