Adam Carroll (Northampton/Portadown) secured a tremendous third place on Sunday for Wymondham-based P1 Motorsport in the Marlboro Masters race at Zandvoort Circuit in Holland.
Team mate Fairuz Fauzy (Northampton/London), made a solid start to his Zandvoort debut, making up six places at the start, but unfortunately he was taken out of the race before he'd even completed one lap.
The Marlboro Masters is an annual contest between the leading drivers from the various Formula 3 European Championships. With the majority of the British teams entering this prestigious event, success at Zandvoort is both hard-fought and dearly coveted. As the leading British team and driver, both Carroll and P1 Motorsport team manager Roly Vincini were understandably pleased with their performance this weekend.
Said Carroll:
"The heat made for a pretty tough race, particularly in its initial stages, but I'm delighted for the team that we beat all the other British runners - that bodes well for the next championship race, at Silverstone next weekend. It's always hard to come up against the European guys because they run on different tyres - basically the same that we had to use this weekend. If we'd had a bit more testing time, I think we could have challenged for the race win, but I'm still pretty happy with the result!"
Added Roly:
"I can't fault the job Adam did this weekend and with some more testing on the different rubber we have to run here, I think we could have been looking seriously at a race win. Fairuz also did a great job on his debut here at Zandvoort and I'm really disappointed for him that he wasn't able to get the race mileage under this belt. Still, not a bad weekend for the team!"
QUALIFYINGAdam Carroll - 5th, Fairuz Fauzy - 26th With a 42 car grid contesting this weekend's Marlboro Masters race, qualifying was split into two sessions each for odd and even numbers - with the quickest driver overall taking pole. Although up against the financial muscle of the F3 Euroseries runners, P1 Motorsport's two drivers were immediately in the thick of the action, keen to prove the undoubted competitiveness of the British series.
Carroll, who contested the race last season, was immediately on the pace and mixing it with the best of them. A sensational lap on new rubber with ten minutes remaining in the first session saw him grab pole position - only to lose the advantage just yards later when ASM's Alexandre Premat shaved 1/10th of a second of Carroll's lap to jump to the head of the time sheet. Although the second session for Carroll's group was slower, British runner James Rossiter edged him out of second place by just 1/100th of a second. Fully committed, as ever, Carroll was determined to reclaim his position, but an excursion at turn two with ten minutes to go meant his challenge was over. Carroll was therefore classified third in his session - and fifth overall.
Twenty-one year old Fauzy acquitted himself well during qualifying, his first competitive experience of the 2.67-mile Circuit Park Zandvoort. Having secured a podium finish on his debut outing with the P1 Motorsport team, at Oulton Park just three weeks ago, Fauzy knew he faced a steep learning curve on his first Marlboro Masters appearance. After a solid first session, the young gun secured 13th position and declared himself happy with the progress made by himself and the team. Unfortunately a raft of yellow caution flags in the second session ruined Fauzy's run on new rubber so he was unable to improve. A final combined qualifying position of 26th was perhaps not a true reflection of Fauzy's potential this weekend.RACEAdam Carroll - 3rd , Fairuz Fauzy - DNF Carroll made a great start from fifth on the grid and was immediately up with second row men, James Rossiter and Lucas Di Grassi. In fact he'd made such a tremendous start that he was in a position to challenge for third going into the first corner, but Rossiter just held on as Carroll sliced his way past Di Grassi to claim fourth. Before a full lap had been run, the Safety Car was deployed due to an accident on the opening lap and, at the restart, Carroll made another lightening getaway as the front runners piled down to the first corner. This time Carroll got the better of Rossiter as the Englishman was pushed out wide and Carroll fired through into third. From then on the race settled down, with the top two having established a small gap back to Carroll in third and the rest of the pack. Although no one was trying harder to close the gap to the leading duo, Carroll was unable to make any real headway, but he pulled away from Rossiter as the race progressed and could only hope that one of the leaders made a mistake. In fact, his wishes nearly came true when, with just four laps remaining, leader Eric Salignon spun on his own, gifting the race lead - and win - to ASM team mate Alexandre Premat. Unfortunately for Carroll, Salignon managed to rejoin just ahead of him, with Carroll taking the flag in a fine third place, over nine seconds ahead of Rossiter in fourth.
Unhappily, Fauzy's Zandvoort race debut was short - and far from sweet. After a terrific start from 26th on the grid, the young gun had blasted his way up the order to 20th in the first two corners. But going into turn three, Fauzy was held up as the pack jostled for position - and although he managed to avoid contact with the cars in front of him, he was hit from behind and subsequently launched onto the kerb. And that's where he stayed, as his P1 Motorsport Dallara became firmly beached. An unfortunate end to a very solid Zandvoort showing for the talented young Malaysian.
