Japanese ace Yu Kanamaru topped the first day of the two-day test at the Circuito de Jerez to get the era of the newly renamed Formula 3.5 V8 underway.
The EuroFormula Open race winner continued with the Pons Racing outfit that gave him his Formula Renault 3.5 Series debut this season, and set the pace with a time of 1m28.067s in the morning session, although he could only manage a time of 1m28.668s in the afternoon.
Egor Orudzhev, also back with the team he ran with during 2015, ended fastest in the afternoon session, just 0.016s back for Arden Motorsport.
Kanamaru was more than a second faster than newly crowned Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 Series champion Jack Aitken during the morning session, with the British driver testing with Fortec Motorsports, who took both the Formula Renault 3.5 Series Teams’ title and the Drivers’ championship with Oliver Rowland in 2015.
Matthieu Vaxiviere, who finished runner up to Rowland, finished third in the morning session for the new Spirit of Race team, who made their first appearance in the series having taken over the running of the Draco Racing machines post-season.
Jake Hughes, who was a race winner in Eurocup in 2015, finished the morning in fourth for Strakka Racing, just ahead of the team’s regular 2015 driver Gustav Malja.
Hughes finished second behind Orudzhev during the afternoon session, with the Briton 0.143s back on the Russian, while Vaxiviere once again third ahead of Aitken, while Marvin Kirchhöfer, a race winner in the GP3 Series in both 2014 and 2015 was fifth for AVF.
There were a few red flag interruptions during the day, with Hughes stopping on track and both Kirchhöfer and Jehan Daruvala spinning in the morning, while Matevos Isaakyan spun off in the afternoon.
Jerez Test Day 1 Times (Combined)
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