Felix Rosenqvist was truly the man on song in the Styrian hills, as he again asserted his dominance on the 4.326km long Red Bull Ring for the third race of the weekend before the six-week rest between now and the Norisring, where the season will resume once again. Russian driver Daniil Kvyat scored his third successive second place finish for Carlin ahead of Austria’s Lucas Auer, who brought national pride to the fore once again as he secured another third place this time around on home soil.
But there was action on track, with Carlin’s Jann Mardenborough spinning, and with the Brit being stuck, Eurointernational’s Tom Blomqvist could not avoid his fellow countryman in the melee, and collected the youngster, along with Mans Grenhagen and Dennis van de Laar from Van Amersfoort Racing collecting each other as a consequence.
Marciello had taken the lead at the start from Kvyat, but lost out to both drivers, as Rosenqvist instigated an audacious overtake of both the Russian and Italian drivers in rapid succession, showing that his car was set up perfectly for overtaking and combative situations when it came to going for the win.
Marciello dropped down to eighth after the restart, showing that he was not running away with the title as he had shown over previous race weekends, which meant that Rosenqvist became the first person to take three wins in one race weekend in the FIA F3 European Championship’s history, as well as narrow the gap to his Italian rival to just 27.5 points, going into the 6-week gap before the series fires back on all cylinders at the Norisring.
Harry Tincknell and Jordan King made it a British round-off for the top five, as well as Carlin showing good pace over the weekend, as the team looks to hit back at both Prema Powerteam and kfzteile24 Mücke Motorsport when the season continues, with Marciello finishing in P6 ahead of Nicholas Latifi, Alex Lynn, Luis Felipe Derani and Roy Nissany, who completed the top ten. Tatiana Calderon again had a result to remember, as the spirited Colombian racer ended up 17th overall, her best finish of the weekend.
Rosenqvist had nothing but a perfect weekend to celebrate: “The third race started with a tough battle for the lead on the opening lap, in which I managed to beat Daniil and Raffaele. The re-start after the safety car intervention went well for me and I was able to hold onto the lead. However, I couldn’t make a mistake today, because Daniil was behind me all the time.”
We now move back to Germany, as the Norisring will provide the next chapter entry, the next twist in the tale, as it is a case of Sweden versus Italy in the world of Formula 3, with this title not yet sown up by anybody…
