Double R Racing’s Matt Solomon and Nicolas Pohler experienced a challenging end to the first half of the FIA Formula 3 European Championship season at a rain-hit Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium over the weekend, 20th/21st June.
Round 14 on Saturday afternoon, the second of the event’s three contests, was the most fruitful for the Woking team’s category rookies with Solomon posting a 19th place finish while Pohler ended the incident packed encounter in 22nd position.
Although the team-mates did experience more than their share of bad luck across the weekend, they fortunately avoided being caught-up in any of the major incidents which occurred – a series of collisions in Saturday’s races resulting in a dressing down for the entire grid from the FIA F3 officials.
“I’ve got to say, the FIA driver steward Emanuele Pirro gave an excellent briefing after the second race on Saturday which was definitely required after what we saw happening out there with some of the drivers”, said Double R team boss Anthony ‘Boyo’ Hieatt.
“It was a tough weekend for Matt and Nici, not helped by the difficult conditions, but they both showed some good promise. Race three wasn’t the way we wanted to end the weekend, but all focus now is on making some bigger steps forward at the Norisring next weekend.”
Qualifying on Friday, 19th June, certainly provided its challenges for the drivers with rain affecting session one and red flag stoppages in the damp second session having an impact on the eventual starting order for all three races.
Solomon began round 13 on Saturday morning from 23rd on the grid with Pohler in 28th position and although all drivers started the weekend’s first encounter on slick Hankook tyres, overnight rain left the track surface very slippery with a number of wet patches off line.
Both making clean starts to race one, Solomon threaded his way through the first corner safely in the middle of a tight pack and went on to climb into the top 20 on the opening lap while Pohler, after avoiding a spinning car at La Source, ultimately concluded the first lap in 32nd position.
Each of the Double R drivers enjoyed close battles, Solomon swapping positions around the top 20 throughout the first half of the contest, but on lap 12, while running in 21st place, a tangle resulted in a loss of time and eventual retirement.
Pohler, meanwhile, battled back well after his slip back on lap one and gained six places to climb into 26th position with just under four laps to run. Embroiled in a tight four car battle during the latter stages, the German moved into 25th when erstwhile race leader Antonio Giovinazzi was forced out with a puncture three laps from the end. Pohler was, though, edged back to 27th place before the flag.
For round 14 on Saturday afternoon, taking place on a dry track, Pohler lined-up an improved 17th on the grid with Solomon in 23rd position but the German was shuffled back behind his team-mate during a busy opening lap with the pair running in 22nd and 23rd into the second tour.
Pohler soon hit back, though, and into lap three he was ahead of Solomon once more as the Double R duo strived to break into the top 20 with positions changing at a rapid rate. Then, on lap five, racing fell under caution with the first of three Safety Car periods following a tangle at the chicane.
No sooner had the action resumed a lap later, the Safety Car was deployed again after a dramatic incident in the braking zone for Les Combes where the three leading cars were all wiped out. Then, at the second re-start on lap 10, yet another incident occurred when Gustavo Menezes’ car was launched into the air along Kemmel Straight – coming to rest upside down at Les Combes.
Unsurprisingly, the worrying accident, from which Menezes thankfully emerged unscathed, led to the contest ending under yellow flags with the time limit expiring during the recovery process. So, after 12 laps, Solomon ended the second Spa race in 19th position with Pohler in 22nd place.
Round 15 on Sunday went wrong from the start for both Double R drivers with Solomon the first to encounter troubles, his Dallara failing to fire-up on the grid prior to the green flag lap due to battery failure. Pushed into the pitlane by marshals, Solomon eventually joined the race two laps down and finished 25th but was able to show what might have been with pace a match for the top 10.
Pohler, meanwhile, started in 17th position and made a good start to the damp contest but at La Source he was squeezed by cars on either side and sustained damage which resulted in a bitterly disappointing retirement.
Double R Racing now has a very busy few days before an even busier weekend, with its FIA Formula 3 European Championship and MSA Formula squads both in action next weekend, 27th/28th June. The F3 crew will be competing at the Norisring in Germany while MSA Formula drivers Matheus Leist and Tarun Reddy will be back in action at Croft Circuit in the UK.
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