Adam Carroll finished sixth in the sprint race and fifth in the feature event for the Belmayne A1 Grand Prix Team Ireland in round five of the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport at the Taupo Motorsports Park in New Zealand, writes RTÉ Sport's John Kenny.
Starting from seventh on the grid in the opening sprint race after an indifferent qualifying session Carroll initially jumped into sixth and then held position bringing the Irish car home for a points finish.
The New Zealand car driven by Johnny Reid won the race from pole position ahead of Germany and France.
The Feature race posed a bigger challenge for Ireland with Carroll starting in a lowly 13th position on grid but a disastrous start saw him hit the USA car and he damaged the front wing causing the Irish team to make an unscheduled pit stop to replace the nose cone.
Luckily enough when Carroll emerged back out on track in last place, the safety car had been deployed enabled the Irish driver to catch onto the back of the pack and after staying out a few extra laps in the first pit stop window the team got him back out in 13th.
He continued to push hard and caught onto the battle for 11th between Switzerland and Pakistan and when the pair made contact Carroll capitalized, moving up into 11th by lap 16.
In a storming drive then reeled in USA and when their driver Jonathan Summerton ran wide on lap 34 ,Carroll was up to 10th.
As the second pit stop window opened on lap 34 Carroll put in some fantastic lap times before stopping and helped by a clean pit stop from the Irish crew elevated himself to sixth.
Switzerland were then penalised with a drive through penalty which promoted Carroll to a stunning fifth on lap 41 and he was then left to chase the battle for second up ahead, eventually crossing the line only four seconds off the lead after a storming drive in what was an action-packed feature.
Carroll said: 'The Sprint race was good. I got a good start and was nearly round the outside of the Netherlands but he launched up the inside and hit me quite hard which bent the steering.
'I then had to do the rest of the race with bent steering but it wasn't too bad and I still managed to put in some good lap times and we scored some solid points. The car felt good; there was good grip and balance today.'
The race was won by Germany with Canada a surprise second ahead of France.
New Zealand now lead the series on 82 points with Ireland now up to 6th in the 11 round series on 50 points. The next round is in Eastern Creek near Sydney Australia at the beginning of February.
Championship Standings:
1 New Zealand 82,
2 Switzerland 80,
3 France 80,
4 Germany 65,
5 South Africa 59,
6 Ireland 50,
7 Netherlands 49,
8 Great Britain 48,
9 India 28,
10 China 28,
11 Brazil 27,
12 Canada 22.
