Friday 2nd September: Free Practice 17.50 – 18.35
Saturday 3rd September: Qualifying: 09.45 – 10.15
Saturday 3rd September Race 1: 17.15 – 18.05
Sunday 4th September Race 2: 09.15 – 09.50 (all times are GMT+2)
Pirelli have nominated the Soft compound for this event.
Pirelli’s Racing Manager Mario Isola commented: “The high ambient and track temperatures made for a big challenge, particularly on Saturday, and those drivers who deployed effective tyre management were rewarded with strong results. In GP3 we actually decided to modify the original nomination for Spa, which was going to be medium, in favour of soft. This was a decision taken thanks to our very good co-operation with the series promoter, in order to set an additional challenge for the GP3 drivers with tyre management. By the end of the 40-minute race we saw quite a lot of degradation, with drivers able to deal with oversteer, or gain an advantage from having looked after their tyres in the early part of the race.”
Winner! Matt gets ready for his Chicken Goulash!
After posting his best qualifying result to take a front row start, Matt Parry (WRDA member & 2013 Welsh Young Driver of the Year) stormed to dominant win after leading from start to finish to pocket his first GP3 race! Matt, made himself an instant Welsh hero after making a good start and maintained a comfortable margin back to Trident and Ferrari Driver Academy’s Antonio Fuoco in second. Arden International’s Jake Dennis achieved his maiden GP3 rostrum in third.
Pole sitter Nyck de Vries , from Holland, was left stranded, as the rest of the pack passed him on the formation lap, and had to start the race from the pitlane, leaving the way clear for Parry to pull a 1.2s advantage over Fuoco after the opening lap with Dennis, Nirei Fukuzumi, Leclerc and Ralph Boschung completing the top five. Parry was calm at the front of the field as he started to extend his lead over Fuoco to win by over 3 seconds! After 22 laps, the chequered flag was waved to an ecstatic Parry who was happy to celebrate his maiden win in the category. It was also the second victory for Finnish Koiranen GP team. Fuoco again was happy to take yet another rostrum, marking his consistency, whilst Dennis finally broke the duck off his back after a series of bad luck to enjoy some well-deserved champagne!
After the race Matt was ecstatic! ‘Yeah I feel pretty good! Obviously this had been a target this season; to make sure we got a race win. It’s good to get the monkey off the back for both the team and me. We can now take that momentum forward for the remaining ones this year.
We were a little bit lucky with what happened with Nyck. I feel horrible for Nyck as when his car didn’t start, that was bad for him. It made it a lot easier for us so I wanted to make sure I stayed in P1 going into Turn 1. Antonio was on the outside of me as he made a much better start, and Jake was right behind us too. I was on the inside which made it relatively easy to defend. From there it may have looked easy but I was saying to the team you just have a constant battle with yourself. (Laughs). I was just looking in the mirrors and could see Antonio…I was thinking he was going to catch me and I was telling myself not to be stupid and that it was going to be fine. I just kept focused and tried to not make any mistakes. We did that and we came away with the win which was a fantastic feeling. I just need to make sure we keep starting on the front row, it definitely makes it a lot easier than the last few races when we were fighting in the middle of the back. So we need to take that good qualifying forward and just take a lot of confidence from it’
In the reverse grid Race 2, Matt maintained his form to finish 6th and ahead of Denis, as Fuoco slumped to 10th! The points have moved Matt up to 5th in the points, with only 1 point separating him from Fuoco and his Koiranenteam-mate Ralph Boschung! The next races in the 2016 GP3 season is at Hockenheimring, next weekend 29 – 31 Jul.
http://www.gp3series.com/Standings/Driver/
Red Bull Ring Report.
- Matts chances improved after he was boosted to 11th on the grid although it looked as if he had put his car on the front row for race 1! In a very difficult qualifying session which saw mixed conditions, but later had the time disallowed due to exceeding track limits. In a session puncuated by red flags,
- Matt Parry will start 12th, later improved to 11th on the grid for the first of 2 GP3 races!
- http://www.gp3series.com/Live-Timing/
- Schedule:
- Saturday 9th July: Race 1: 16.20 – 17.05
- Red Bull Ring Report. Matt Parry opened his 2016 GP3 Series account with points in both races at the Red Bull Ring in Austria, but felt he could have been standing on the top step of the podium rather than accepting sixth and seventh places. Matt underlined his testing form but had a nightmare in qualifying when he had a repeat of a problem he suffered in last year when the car went into safe mode, two turns from home!
Matt explained “There are a number of safety features built into the GP3 car, and I hit one of the limiters on the engine at just the wrong time. The car went into safety mode approaching turn eight and I lost 50 per cent of the throttle when I tried to accelerate out. That was probably worth two or three tenths, which would have been enough to push me up to at least third on the grid.”Matt knew that he would need to make some quick moves to improve on that, during the opening 24-lap race on Saturday evening, but a poor getaway meant that he had to be aggressive through the first few corners. Having climbed to fourth, however, he found himself caught behind Koiranen GP team-mate Ralph Boschung at turn three, leaving him vulnerable to attack from behind and ultimately costing a couple of positions. Although able to keep pace with those ahead of him, despite running in ‘dirty’ air, Parry’s attempts to re-pass were again frustrated by the limitation of the 2016 car and tyres and, as rain began to fall towards the end of the race, he conceded another position as he sought the driest line.
“I just didn’t race well. My start was poor, but I still managed to be challenging for third part way around the opening lap. Then I got boxed in behind my team-mate and that undid the earlier effort! I had good pace through the middle of the race, but could only manage 6th place, but it should have been better!”
On Sunday morning, with race two had to take its start behind the safety car due to extent of the downpour. Starting from third on the partially-reversed grid, Parry was quickly promoted to second on the road when one of the ART cars developed a problem, but no racing was possible until lap ten.When the field was unleashed, the Welshman made no secret of his intent, harrying leader Jake Hughes into the first corner, but both Britons saw their hopes of a maiden GP3 win disappear on exit as the leader bogged down and Parry had nowhere to go but into the back of the DAMS machine. Although he briefly continued as the new race leader, Parry’s #14 Koiranen car had suffered enough front end damage to hamper both grip and retardation and, when he slithered off the road a couple of corners later, he dropped to seventh as the safety car made the first of several reappearances.
“Despite the conditions, I wanted to go racing as I really felt that I had the ability to win,” Parry said, “I was in second because [Nirei] Fukuzumi had his car lapse into safety mode because of the conditions and, unfortunately, it seems that Jake had a similar issue because he went nowhere exiting turn one. I was so close behind him that there was no way of avoiding contact, and that effectively ended both our races. The contact damaged my front wing and also made it hard to brake, and that’s why I went off the road. After that, it was probably fortunate that the safety car kept returning because it would have been hard for me to hold position.“It’s definitely a missed opportunity as the Koiranen car was clearly very good in the conditions. My team-mate went on to win the race, and I would have had an obvious advantage if I’d managed to get to the front, where there would have been no spray to contend with. It’s frustrating, but it is what it is. I ended up P6 and P7 in R2, Overall we made too many mistakes throughout the weekend. Congratulations to my team-mate Ralph Boschung for the win! I’ll just take whatever positives I can from Austria and look to get something more from my home race this weekend..”Round three of the 2016 GP3 Series takes place in support of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, over the weekend of 8-10 July, and Parry will be hoping to repeat the sort of form that saw him stand on the podium one year ago.
- Race pre-view. The 2016 GP3 season restarted in Austria last weekend, as part of the support to the Austrian Grand Prix. After a 6 week lay-off since the first round in Spain, the series then goes on a run of 4 races in July! The Austrian circuit is now known as ‘The Red Bull Ring’ and is in the Styrian Mountains. The race circuit was founded as Österreichring and hosted the Formula One Austrian Grand Prix for 18 consecutive years, from 1970 to 1987, before it was changed to its current configuration in 1997. It is now owned by Red Bull drinks magnate Dietrich Mateschitz .
Cardiffs’ Matt Parry driving with the Koiranen GP team showed well during the recent tests and has high hopes.
Lap record 1:19.350 (196.264 kph) Ghiotto (Trident)
POLE Position 2015 1:19.350 (196.264 kph) Ghiotto (Trident)
The schedule is as follows
- Practice 1 – 01 Jul, 17:50 Qualifying – 02 Jul, 09:45
- Race 1 – 02 Jul, 17:10 Race 2 – 03 Jul, 09:15
- Live timing via http://www.gp3series.com/
Sky Sports F1 will again carry live coverage of both qualifying and the races.
WRDA member Matthew Parry (the 2013 WRDA Young Driver of the Year) posted the quickest time this morning on a wet track at Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia on the second day of pre-season testing, and followed that up with 3rd in the dry afternoon session. Matt’s best morning lap was 0.064’s faster than ART Grand Prix’s Nirei Fukuzum
|
Driver
|
Team
|
Laptime
|
Laps
|
|
|
1.
|
Charles Leclerc
|
ART Grand Prix
|
1:19.437
|
61
|
|
2.
|
Antonio Fuoco
|
Trident
|
1:19.449
|
49
|
|
3.
|
Matthew Parry
|
Koiranen GP
|
1:19.502
|
32
|
The 2nd Generation Car – GP3/16 Series – Design criteria
WRDA member Matthew Parry (the 2013 WRDA Young Driver of the Year) posted the quickest time this morning on a wet track at Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia on the second day of pre-season testing, and followed that up with 3rd in the dry afternoon session. Matt’s best morning lap was 0.064’s faster than ART Grand Prix’s Nirei Fukuzumi. Ferrari Driver Academy and fellow ART GP debutant Charles Leclerc clocked the fastest time in the afternoon session.
Heavy rain had fallen just prior to the session so the 24 drivers were greeted with a wet track and much cooler temperatures at the start of day two. Conditions were fairly tricky at the beginning of the test due to the volume of spray as the grid ventured out on track with their wet Pirelli tyres.
Fukuzumi was the initial pace-setter before Campos Racing’s Steijn Schothorst took control of the timesheet after one hour and thirty minutes as blue skies and sunshine made a welcome appearance. Trident’s Giuliano Alesi went P1 as he was first to dip under the 1m30s bracket.
The lap-times continued to come down in the latter part of the session as the track dried with Parry recording a time of 1:23.549 on slick tyres. Russian Matevos Isaakyan broke into the 1m22s barrier, which was subsequently followed by a short red flag period after his teammate Ralph Boschung stopped on track.
Once the session resumed, positions swapped every few minutes with Trident’s Antonio Fuoco and ART Grand Prix’s Charles Leclerc first to lap in the 1m21s. Parry found some extra pace to go top before Leclerc retaliated and bettered the Brit’s time by two tenths. In the final ten minutes, Fukuzumi demoted teammate Leclerc to second by a mere 0.004s but the action wasn’t over as Parry returned to the top of the timings by 0.064s.
At the chequered flag Parry, Fukuzumi, Leclerc, Alexander Albon, Artur Janosz, Nyck de Vries, Oscar Tunjo, Antonio Fuoco, Alex Palou and Jake Hughes completed the top ten.
Following the one hour lunch break, Fukuzumi led the way early on before Parry again found some extra pace to leapfrog the Japanese rookie by three tenths. Leclerc lapped a tenth quicker to grab P1, whilst Hughes rose to second in the final half hour. At the close of the afternoon session Leclerc remained unchallenged in front of Hughes, Parry, Santino Ferrucci, Boschung, Kevin Jörg, Fukuzumi, Alexander Albon, Jake Dennis and Konstantin Tereshchenko.
The third and final pre-season test will held at the Circuit de Catalunya on April 20-21 in Barcelona.
Day Two – morning session
| Driver | Team | Laptime | Laps | |
| 1. | Matthew Parry | Koiranen GP | 1:21.476 | 41 |
| 2. | Nirei Fukuzumi | ART Grand Prix | 1:21.560 | 52 |
| 3. | Charles Leclerc | ART Grand Prix | 1:21.564 | 50 |
Jann in Japan #1
Jann Mardenborough got to meet his new team, with teammate Kazuki Hoshino and team boss Masahiro Hasemiin in Yokohama on Sunday. Jann will be driving in the Japanese GT and also the Japan F3 championship in 2016!