Double R Racing’s Fahmi Ilyas conquered extreme wet conditions at the Norisring street circuit in Germany on Sunday, 1st July, to seal a richly deserved top six finish in the third of the weekend’s Cooper Tires British Formula 3 International Series races. Just one week removed from taking a career-best top five finish at Brands Hatch Grand Prix Circuit, the Malaysian arrived at the Norisring aiming to continue his progression up the British F3 order but two unfortunate retirements on Saturday, 30th June, heavily impacted on his potential points haul.Even so, as numerous drivers came to grief on the rain-lashed Nuremberg circuit in round 17 of the season, the 20-year-old climbed his way through the order superbly from 11th on the grid into sixth position to mark one of his best performances of the year so far.The sixth race meeting of the British F3 season actually formed part of the Formula 3 Euroseries event at the German venue, therefore meaning the UK championship competitors had to run with Hankook tyres – rather than Coopers – as per the European regulations.Posing no problem for Fahmi, who experienced Hankook rubber during an F3 Euroseries outing in May, his performance in qualifying was strong and he posted a best lap of 49.834 seconds (166.152 km/h) which was just 0.5 seconds shy of the British F3 pole position.Originally timetabled to take place on Friday, 29th June, qualifying was moved to Saturday morning due to issues with the track surface breaking up in places as the weekend began with incredibly hot temperatures – in stark contrast to the thunderstorms which followed on day three of the event.Fahmi made a superb start to round 15, slicing his way through from ninth on the grid into sixth place in the British F3 classification. The Safety Car appeared on circuit for a few laps following a couple of skirmishes but at the re-start on lap six, the Double R racer held firm.Soon after though, contact from behind at the exit of the first turn unsettled his Dallara-Mercedes and pitched Fahmi into the retaining wall – leading to damaged suspension and a disappointing retirement. Determined to make amends in round 16, which also took place in scorching weather, his car was again hit, this time on lap one, leading to another non-finish with suspension damage.“The car felt really good for race one and I made up a lot of places on the first lap”, said the Kuala Lumpur-born driver, “It all looked good and was going well but I was hit from behind and put into the wall, there was nothing I could do. In race two, luck wasn’t on my side either when my right-rear upright was damaged after contact with another car at the first corner. It was really disappointing.”Fahmi was able to display his true level of performance in the rain-lashed third race of the weekend though which actually started behind the Safety Car due to the amount of standing water and spray. When racing began on lap eight, he made steady progress and by lap 12 he was seventh in British F3.On lap 15, Fahmi was into the coveted top six and going well but a lap later the Safety Car was deployed. Shortly after, officials decided to stop the encounter due to the horrendous conditions so the Malaysian wasn’t able to try and make any additional gains – but sixth was still a terrific result.“The pace was there in race three, I moved up the order well and the car felt good”, commented Fahmi, “If it wasn’t for the red flags being shown, I’m pretty sure we could have moved up another couple of places. Still, sixth was a good result and especially after what happened on Saturday.“We had a lot of problems in practice but in qualifying we made a big step forward in terms of our pace. It’s a big shame what happened in the first two races, all we needed was a bit more luck this weekend and we’d have had three really strong results.”There is now a four week break from action for the Cooper Tires British F3 International Series with rounds 18, 19 and 20 taking place at Belgium’s Spa-Francorchamps on Friday, 27th July, and Saturday, 28th July.2012 Cooper Tires British Formula 3 International Series Driver Standings (after Rd17):11th Fahmi Ilyas, 39pts
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