Heartbreak for pole sitter Gabriele Mini after dominating the first F3 feature race when a time penalty and late safety car pushed him down from first to 8th. However it was an all rookie podium with a F1 driver appearance.
There was no shortage of action in the Sunday F3 Feature Race, with safety cars, time penalties and great over takes from the 2023 F3 drivers. With most of the grid containing rookies all wanting to start the season off to a great start allowed 3 rookies to stand on the podium and also have a Trident 1-2 and a Prema driver in 3rd.
At Lights Out:
Gabriele Minì and Gabriel Bortoleto started on the front row but it was the Trident driver that got the better start when lights went out. coming into Turn 1 he was able to overtake Minì who fell behind ART Grand Prix’s Grégoire Saucy starting in the second row. And one of the favourites of this season.
Down the back of the grid Jonny Edgar, The MP Motorsport driver managed to make up five
places in the opening two laps to get into the points.
With new regulations for the 2023 season allowing DRS to be activated after one racing lap, Bortoleto was already comfortably two seconds up by the time he reached the DRS zone in lap 2. Looking to get back to his starting position Minì showed determination on the brakes around the outside of Saucy through Turn 4 to reclaim second.
Campos Racing following a top podium in both F2 and F3 in the sprint race had its first retirement of Hugh Barter on LAP after Edgar clipped his right rear tyre causing a puncture and forcing the driver to the pits to retire from his first feature race in F3.
Shortly after on Lap 7 the first safety car was deployed following contact at the hairpin between MP’s Mari Boya and Van Amersfoort Racing’s Tommy Smith. The Australian resumed but Boya was due to damage sustained had to pull off track and retire.
At the restart Mini took no time to take a chance on Bortoleto to regain the top position, shortly after his successful overtake he was informed about a five second time penalty. This was for an incorrect position in his box on the grid at the start of the race.
One of the many rookie drivers of this season who was the last confirmed driver announced just days before the first free practice Hitech Pulse-Eight driver Luke Browning. Starting in p17 pulled out all of the overtakes to make it to P8, following the previous day Sprint Race winner Josep (Pepe) Martí through on Trident’s Leonardo Fornaroli, who’s tyres were fading quickly.
Fornaroli’s Trident teammate Oliver Goethe was able to climb up positions and into the podium following a overtake on the outside of Saucy for third.
Towards the end of the race Mini had a comfortable gap between himself and Bortoleto to ensure P1 even with the time penalty. However on the penultimate lap Tommy Smith went too deep into turn 1 thus locking up and making contact with Roberto Faria of PHM Racing by Charouz causing a safety car.
With the gap closing Mini’s podium chances were unlikely, the Alpine junior was still able to secure some points finishing P8. This allowed Bortoleto to be promoted to the top spot and also claimed a point for the fastest lap in his first year in Formula 3. Goethe’s efforts throughout the race gave him second, and rookie Beganovic joined them on the podium rounding out the top 3.
Saucy added more points to ART’s total in fourth following finishing on the podium in the sprint race the day before, as mentioned previously Browning made up 12 places to secure his first F3 points finish in fifth. Martí finished sixth for Campos Racing, after starting 11th. Frederick was seventh, Montoya put in an amazing fight back through the field in ninth and Franco Colapinto rounded out the top 10, after Aron received a five-second time penalty for track limits, dropping the Estonian to 11th after the race ended.
Gabriele afterwards stated he was “Very, very happy to win my first Feature Race in Formula 3. It’s an amazing start to the season, I hope we can keep up like this and thanks to everyone supporting us this weekend”
Gabriele is also part of Fernando Alonso’s management team, which both sprint and feature are apart of, with Alonso’s own podium in the Grand Prix safe to say he had a good weekend!
What’s Next on the F3 2023 Calendar?
Next race will showcase drivers skills and knowledge as racing for the first time in the history of the Formula 3, they go racing in Australia! Racing at Melbourne’s Albert Park Circuit from March 31- April 2. This is a new track for majority of the drivers as most have only raced European circuits so keep an eye out for some drivers as this is their home races, like Tommy Smith.
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