Its Fast, Its Furious, Its Family

ilyas family (Custom)
FOR the Ilyas family, motorsports is definitely a family activity.

And come this year’s Merdeka Millennium Endurance Race on Aug 6-8 at the Sepang International circuit, this family will transform themselves to a racing team.

Led by the oldest son Helmi, Team Cartrade-Abt Motorsports who will be competing in a Lotus 2-Eleven in Class A1 , will be joined by his brothers Adam and Fahmi for the first time.

The team was announced in a simple ceremony at the VW Cars Boutique at The Curve in Mutiara Damansara yesterday, 28th July 2009.

Helmi and Adam are no strangers to the MME grid but it is the 17-year-old Fahmi who will be making his grand debut in one of Asia most prestigious endurance race.

Interestingly, his inclusion is more of an advantage for the team full backed by the Cartrade group.

Fahmi is currently competing in the Formula BMW Pacific, and has already had several podium finishes, with one race victory.

“For us, it is definitely going to be an exciting weekend as all three of us have never raced in the same team together,” said Helmi who has been competing in the MME since 2006.

That year Helmi and Adam along with Hisham Jamhudi finished sixth in class.

In 2007, the same trio took fifth spot while last year did not finish the race although they qualified third on the grid.

“Although it is his first MME race, Fahmi’s inclusion to the team is definitely an advantage for us. He has been very impressive in the Formula BMW Pacific and we hope he can carry the momentum into the MME as well,” said Helmi.

“His first win in the Formula BMW Pacific was in SIC which is another plus point for the team,” he added.

To make it a total family affair, the trio’s father, Dato’ Ilyas Mohamed will be the Team Principal.

“This year the Team will be professionally managed Proton R3 headed by Tengku Djan Ley who is also engineer for A1 Team Malaysia,” said Dato’ Ilyas.

For this week, the Team will shift their focus on final preparations as testing sessions begin at SIC.

“I am expecting positive practice sessions ahead of raceday.”

“We will need to find the perfect setting for the car and also the optimum driving order between us in this time,” said Helmi.

Besides announcing the team for this race, the Cartrade Group also took the opportunity to hand over the fleet of TRACKWAGENS to SIC CEO Razlan Razali as part of sponsorship agreement with SIC for the 2009 MME.

“At the Cartrade Group, we believe sports is an important area to help build our beloved nation,” said Dato’ Ilyas.

“We hope and want to see a great race at Sepang on race weekend like SIC always organises. We hope that with this sponsorship we can is in someway help make it a smoother process,” he added.

MME is not the first or last sporting event that the Cartrade Group have supported.

Among the others big events the Cartrade Group have sponsored are the 2009 Malaysian Formula 1 Grand Prix, the Super GT and the Le Tour de Langkawi.

The Cartrade Group is also scheduled to provide cars for the upcoming MotoGP, the A1 Grand Prix and the Monsoon Cup in 2009.

brothers (Custom)