Hauger leads the championship, Leclerc and Stanek the position collectors without points. F3 raced in France

Formula 3 was back in action and presented itself during the F1 race weekend at the Paul Ricard circuit near Le Castellet in France.30 drivers, including Moravian driver Roman Stanek, were pitted against each other in three 20-lap races where they fought for every metre.

Qualification

In qualifying, Frederick Vesti of the ART Grand Prix team took pole position for Sunday’s main race, managing to beat championship leader Denis Hauger of PREMA Racing. The home driver Victor Martins was especially successful, as he drove to third place for Sunday’s race.

ART GP was the only team that managed to fit all three of its monoposts into the top 10, something that neither Prema nor MP Motorsport managed to do, as they did not have at least one driver in the top 10. It is true that PREMA had a very bad luck with the machinery that failed Arthur Leclerc. The Monegasque had to start from the last 30th position.

The Czech Republic’s representative Roman Stanek finished in 17th place and was relatively far from the points. In the first weekend, the 17-year-old Hitech Grand Prix driver picked up one point for 10th place.

Race 1 (20 laps – 15 points for the winner)

With a total of 12 drivers on the grid for the opening two races in F3, unlike F2, Calan Williams (who finished 12th in qualifying) was on pole position. Next to him then stood the very familiar name of Schumacher. This time it was David Schumacher, son of F1 driver Ralph and nephew of the more famous Michael.

The start went off without too much trouble, but then Jenzer Motorsport’s Johnathan Hoggard had to retire after contact and the Virtual Safety Car (VSC) followed. There was a big battle at the front, with Japan’s Ayumu Iwasa taking the lead from Williams and American Logan Sargeant of the Czech team Charouz racing system leading after 8 laps ahead of Iwasa and Williams.

The de facto battle came to a head exactly halfway through the race when Iwasa passed Sargeant off the track before Turn 10 and earned himself a five-second penalty. He fell to 8th place in the final race. Even so, he was the best driver of the Hitech team, for which Roman Stanek also drives.

Arthur Leclerc started the big chase. The man who started 30th was 16th after 10 laps, which would have set him up for a much better starting position for the afternoon race. In addition, he continued to make a massive narrowing of his deficit. In the end, it turned out to be a fantastic 12th place, which secured him pole position in the afternoon’s measurement of strength.

The duo of Victor Martins and Alexander Smoljar also rode solidly in the points. These two drivers eventually found themselves in a direct battle for the win in Race 1. And it was a battle right up to the last lap. In the end, the Russian driver had the decisive manoeuvre tucked away until lap 19 at turn 11. For there he took advantage of better traction, dipped to the inside track and never let go of the lead. In the final, Smolyar moved up 6 places and Martins 8.

But there was also a fight at the back, as two Prema drivers and title contenders Olli Caldwell and Denis Hauger came through for important points. The latter, however, lost his sole lead in the championship with a 9th place finish as the home team’s Martins also took the lead.

David Schumacher suffered a big drop, dropping from the front row at the start to 15th at the finish. His Trident colleagues fared better though, with another home driver Clément Novalak and Australian Jack Doohan finishing 5th and 7th respectively.

Roman Stanek started from 17th position, but dropped to 21st after the end of the VSC. Unfortunately, he then suffered further complications and finished 26th after a pit stop, which meant a lot of work for him on Saturday afternoon.

Race 2 (20 laps – 15 points for the winner)

As mentioned, Arthur Leclerc, brother of F1 driver Charles, was on pole position. Right at the start, the Monegasque lost his front row rival as Jake Crawford messed with the clutch and got stuck. He dropped from 2nd to 22nd place. On the other hand, Victor Martins and Roman Stanek had a great start and scored a number of positions.

For a long time, the entire PREMA trio of Arthur Leclerc, Dennis Hauger, Olli Caldwell were at the front. The battles for a long time were mainly outside the podium positions, with Victor Martins pushing forward again. The young Frenchman started from 11th place but, as in the first race, he pushed forward very quickly.

Finally, on the penultimate lap, he passed Caldwell, a manoeuvre that earned him a podium finish. Moreover, thanks to the two points, he was tied with Hauger on 12 points and the championship lead remained split. The best possible invitation to the continuation of the season, which counts 5 more race weekends.

In the end, the race was won in start-finish style by Arthur Leclerc, for whom it was not only his first win, but also the young Monegasque’s first points in F3. Right after the race, Charles Leclerc, a Ferrari driver who also drove for the PREMA Racing team, went to congratulate his brother. Who knows if one day we will see both brothers in the same F1 team.

Roman Stanek also did well and although he didn’t get any points, he managed to move his car up 6 places from 26th. This was definitely a positive going into Sunday’s race, which he started from a qualifying position.

Race 3 (20 laps – 25 points for the winner)

Sunday’s race was affected by rain, which forced all drivers to change to wet tyres. Dennis Hauger had a fantastic start, getting away quickly and sprinting past Frederik Vesti before the first corner to settle into first place.

The race ended on lap three for Olli Caldwell, who apparently made contact with one of the MP Motorsport drivers and had to retire with a damaged suspension. More drivers travelled off track, including two drivers from the Czech Charouz team, Logan Sargeant and Reshad de Gerus.

A very curious situation occurred around the halfway point of the race, when Logan Sargeant had to retire due to the fact that the red light on the rear of his monopost, which must be switched on in the rain, could not be activated.

As in the previous two races, it was Vesti who struggled, unable to find his race pace on the circuit near the town of Le Castellet and picking up points by the skin of his teeth. The big championship contender thus lost contact with the front.

Clément Novalak and Victor Martins had been fighting for the lead for a long time, so they could leave 25 points “at home”. However, the battle for the win eventually came down to the other two candidates, Jack Doohan and Dennis Hauger. And in the end, the first-named Team Trident driver took the win and moved up to third in the championship standings.

The absolute last Reshad de Gerus also had a nice campaign, who changed to dry tyres halfway through the race and gradually pulled away from penultimate David Schumacher. In the final laps he was even running times 10 seconds faster than his closest pursuers.

Roman Stanek finished 15th and after one point from Catalunya he leaves France without points. But the rider has shown improvement since last year. Last year, Stanek struggled to maintain his positions and often lost places.

Stanek and his 29 rivals will get their next chance in 14 days at the Red Bull Ring during the Austrian Grand Prix. He will go into the race weekend as championship leader Dennis Hauger, who trails Martins by six points.

Driver of the weekend according to Ruik:: Arthur Leclerc (Monaco, PREMA Racing)

Table after 2 race weekends::