The summer break is officially over! The second half of the season swings into gear at the legendary Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium for Round 5 of the 2015 GP3 Series.
The Hungaroring in Budapest hosted the fourth round of the campaign and it was Trident’s Luca Ghiotto who returned to commanding form to extend his Series lead. The Italian pocketed his third pole of the year and held off the advances of Emil Bernstorff early on, and then fellow title rival Esteban Ocon to claim his second victory of the season. Ghiotto also posted his fourth fastest lap to pocket two further points for good measure.
Arden International’s Kevin Ceccon recorded his second consecutive Race 2 win after making a lightning getaway from second on the grid. Once again, Ocon was on the podium, with Marvin Kirchhöfer and Matthew Parry taking the other podium places over the weekend.
Following Ghiotto’s impressive points haul of 39 during the Budapest weekend, the Trident ace has increased his advantage at the top of the standings to 23 points. The ART Grand Prix duo of Kirchhöfer and Ocon are his nearest challengers and will be hot on his tail hoping to close the deficit this weekend.
The Spa-Francorchamps track needs no introduction as one of the most famous and historic circuit’s on the calendar. The sweeping elevations around the 7km track are not for the faint-hearted with classic sections such as Eau Rouge and Pouhon. The weather is notoriously changeable in the Ardennes forest with parts of the circuit potentially bone dry with others in heavy puddles making for very challenging conditions.
The drivers are raring to go following the summer break and they are keen to stamp their authority on the second half of a very tightly contested season.
Warm Up: Mitchell Gilbert - Carlin“Everybody knows Spa-Francorchamps is a mega circuit. It’s a “proper track”. You feel the adrenalin as there isn’t much run-off. It combines all of the skills you need as a driver: high and low speed corners. It’s particularly challenging in qualifying as with it being 7k long, if you make a mistake on one corner, you don’t normally get a second chance to put another lap together. You get one shot.
“The weather can be a nightmare. You see the dark clouds coming over the mountains and brace yourself. You never what’s going to happen. Generally I think this track is hard on tyres as there are so many corners and of course it’s so long. As a team, I feel we are well suited to tracks where there is high tyre degradation so I’m hoping for a good result.
“Pouhon is my favourite part of the track. I have driven through it flat out before and it’s blown my mind. I can’t wait to drive it in a GP3 car for the first time.”
Season stats
2 The number of drivers to have scored points in all eight races: Ghiotto and Kirchhöfer.
23 The points’ advantage Series leader Luca Ghiotto has over Marvin Kirchhöfer in the Drivers’ Standings.
5 The highest number of podiums achieved this season is by Esteban Ocon.
8 The number of teams to have recorded points so far this season (newcomers Campos Racing are waiting to post their first points of the campaign).
Noteworthy:
Beitske Visser will compete in Spa-Francorchamps in the #28 Trident car. The Dutch driver has completed one round in GP3 back in Barcelona 2014.
Campos Racing will field just two drivers this weekend with #23 Zaid Ashkanani and #24 Alex Palou.
Series leader Ghiotto achieved pole for Trident here at Spa-Francorchamps in 2014 in his debut GP3 qualifying session.
There have been five different winners from the first eight races: Esteban Ocon (1), Marvin Kirchhöfer (2), Luca Ghiotto (2), Oscar Tunjo (1) and Kevin Ceccon (2).
Ghiotto leads the Drivers’ Standings on 121 points ahead of Marvin Kirchhöfer (98), Esteban Ocon (96), Emil Bernstorff (75) and Kevin Ceccon (54).
ART Grand Prix leads the way in the Teams’ Standings on 195 points. In second is Trident on 140 with Arden International on 129 points.
