Trident Motorsport driver Antonio Fuoco ended the first GP3 Series pre-season test as the quickest driver around the Circuito Estoril in Portugal.
The Italian driver’s best lap time of the day came during the morning session with a 1m27.293s, almost half a second faster than the best time set at track with the previous generation car.
There was a new addition to the final day’s running with Chinese driver Hongli Ye testing for Jenzer Motorsport.
The session was halted early when a red flag was brought out following Konstantin Tereshchenko spinning his Campos Racing car. When the session restarted Arden International‘s Jake Dennis was first to lap into the 1m27s ahead of team-mate Jack Aitken.
Another red flag was brought out when ART Grand Prix‘s Charles Leclerc stopped on track.
When the session once again restarted, Dennis improved on his own personal best lap time only for Fuoco to fly to the top of the time sheets – bettering the Briton’s time by almost half a second.
The session was yet again haltered after Fuoco and Artur Janosz both stopped on track, when the session got underway again there were 25 minutes left on the clock until the one hour lunch break.
As the chequered flag signalled the end of the morning session, Fuoco remained in P1 ahead of Dennis, Alexander Albon, Sandy Stuvik, Nyck de Vries, Kevin Jörg, Aitken, Tatiana Calderon, Matevos Isaakyan and Santino Ferrucci.
Following the lunch break, the initial pace was held by Janosz ahead of the DAMS pair of Jake Hughes and Jörg. The red flag was once again brought out for a small period of time as a result of Stuvik stopping on track.
When the session was live once again Janosz continued to head the timesheet with the other drivers working through their programme of race runs.
As the clock ticked down the final hour rookie Ye made contact with the barrier at Turn 2 and Jörg stopped on track. Alex Palou and Oscar Tunjo jumped up the order to second and third place once the track activity resumed.
In the final 15 minutes, Matthew Parry stopped at Turn 5 causing a final red flag, but there was still more action to come as Fuoco improved to demote his team-mate Janosz to second by lapping two tenths of a second quicker.
As the test came to its conclusion, Fuoco remained unchallenged ahead of: Janosz, Palou, Tunjo, Parry, Akash Nandy, Dennis, Hughes, Jörg and Ye.
The second pre-season test will be held at Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia on April 07-08.
Morning Session
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Afternoon Session
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