Preparations for the British F3 season gained pace today with 17 cars taking to the Spa Francorchamps track for the first of two days testing.
It was excitement all round in the basement of Overtake Motorsport Towers as the British F3 season edged closer with day one of testing at Spa.
Linus Lundqvist of Double R Racing set the fastest time of the day, with a 2m.16 seconds lap in the afternoon session.
Lundqvist was almost a second clear of Fortec’s French star Tristan Charpentier, who was just a fraction quicker than the morning pace setter, Lanan Racing’s Kush Maini. Impressively, the fastest times set today were almost two seconds quicker than the pole lap in 2017.
Britain’s own Tom Gamble continued his impressive pre-season form by going fourth fastest in his Fortec machine, with Krish Mahadik fifth for Double R.
Jamie Chadwick was up next and sixth quickest for Douglas Motorsport, ahead of series returnee, Fortec’s Manuel Maldonado. British F3’s youngest competitor Jusuf Owega was eighth for Hillspeed, just 0.081 seconds off Maldonado, and 0.081 seconds ahead of Carlin’s Nicolai Kjaergaard.
Sun Yue Yang completed the top-10 for Carlin.
Billy Monger, continuing his pre-season testing schedule ahead of a highly anticipated season, was 11th for Carlin, ahead of Double R Racing’s Pavan Ravishankar. It is truly amazing how far Monger has come since his horror crash last year at Donnington and he continues to impress.
Swede Arvin Esmaeili, who is currently eyeing a potential move into the series with Douglas Motorsport was next up, ahead of another possible driver, Sasakorn Chaimongkol, driving for Hillspeed.
Lanan Racing’s rookie Josh Mason continued his strong progress by setting a time less than one and a half seconds off the pole time for last year’s race, and was ahead of Douglas Motorsport’s Alexandra Mohnhaupt and Hillspeed’s Ben Hurst.
Speaking at the end of day one testing, Lundqvist commented: “Today has been very good, a lot of mileage and we played around quite a bit with different set-ups, and found a good one that seemed to suit me. I think we really did hit the sweet spot when the track was at its best and I was able to put in a good lap. All in all, the car felt great and let’s see what tomorrow can bring.”
An early start again for the F3 desk as testing resumes tomorrow, all 17 drivers are set to return to the circuit for another full day of running. With a new format set to take shape in 2018, drivers and teams will want to make the most of the time they have.
BRDC British F3 Championship, Spa Francorchamps test, day one result:
1. Linus Lundqvist, Double R Racing, 2m16.189s
2. Tristan Charpentier, Fortec Motorsports, +0.610s
3. Kush Maini, Lanan Racing, +0.637s
4. Tom Gamble, Fortec Motorsports, +1.016s
5. Krish Mahadik, Double R Racing, +1.174s
6. Jamie Chadwick, Douglas Motorsport, +1.334s
7. Manuel Maldonado, Fortec Motorsports, +1.507s
8. Jusuf Owega, Hillspeed, +1.588s
9. Nicolai Kjaergaard, Carlin, +1.647s
10. Sun Yue Yang, Carlin, +1.670s
11. Billy Monger, Carlin, +2.089s
12. Pavan Ravishankar, Double R Racing, +2.800s
13. Arvin Esmaeili, Douglas Motorsport, +2.838s
14. Sasakorn Chaimongkol, Hillspeed, +2.920s
15. Josh Mason, Lanan Racing, +3.232s
16. Alexandra Mohnhaupt, Douglas Motorsport, +4.449s
17. Ben Hurst, Hillspeed, +6.900s.
