As usual, the first race of the weekend in Formula 3 is on the saturday. With a tight qualifying, except for Nikola Tsolov that showed incredible speed, who can take the win home ?
The Formula 3 drivers offered a chaotic sprint race this morning. With a lot of overtakes, action was everywhere on track. It began even before the start of the race with Bruno Del Pino stalling before the formation lap. Luckily, he managed to start before the end of the grid so he could take his place back. Some drivers used old soft tyres, like Giusti or Câmara, to have a new set for tomorrow’s race. For Charlie Wurz, starting third, this race will be a DRS game.
Leader from the beginning to the end
James Wharton kept the lead, but had a menacing Alessandro Giusti behind him. Charlie Wurz and Ugo Ugochukwu almost made contact twice, with the McLaren academy driver having to take wide. A contact between Ho and Sharp took Tuukka Taponen out. The ART driver and the Rodin driver both stopped on track. As the safety car was called, Hedley went into the pit to change his front wing. Christian Ho also went back into the pit but to dnf, as his front left tyre was not straight anymore. He later took a 10-seconds penalty for his move. In four laps, Nikola Tsolov managed to take four places up, showing the great pace that he has once again.
At the restart, the Bulgarian battled with Voisin for seventh place. With James Wharton being slow on his restart, it took everyone behind by surprise. Benavides also took p9 away from Del Pino. Badoer went wide into turn 1, creating a chaotic situation with Câmara trying to overtake, and a three cars battle behind with Tsolov, Voisin and Benavides. Del Pino was too quick on turn 3 and lost his front wing into the Aix Racing of Benavides. The latter went into the gravel and had a front rear puncture. Ugochukwu tried to overtake Wurz but was a bit too optimistic and went into the gravel, making him lose time. Tsolov made an incredible overtake on Câmara into turn 10. The battle between the two championship leaders is definitely on track. Meanwhile, both Prema’s drivers battle hard. Câmara’s rival helped him out of the track and he lost a lot of track position.
The move that changed everything
Brando Badoer dived into Turn 1 and took Charlie Wurz with him, making the Trident driver dnf. Safety car was called for the second time, and Noah Stromsted went into the pit for a front wing problem. Wharton keeps the lead again with a fight for the top 2. It was heated between Ugochukwu and Tsolov, with Inthraphuvasak coming to make it a three car battle. Câmara is once again pushed wide and loses four places. Théophile Nael took the upper hand on the Trident driver but went too far and lost positions. In the end, James Wharton won his first Formula 3 race, in front of Alessandro Giusti and Ugo Ugochukwu. Good to note that Tim Tramnitz finished p7, when he started p17.