Antonio Fuoco was back on form as the Trident driver showed off his ability at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza. Now sitting just 24 points behind GP3 Series leader Charles Leclerc, the Italian knows the championship battle is in touching distance ahead of the final two rounds.
Fuoco himself picked up a third place in race two at Monza, though was disappointed to have lost a golden opportunity at a win after starting on reverse grid pole. Sadly for the 20-year-old, the race pace was not up his one lap performance.
“After free practice, the pace was quite good and in qualifying, before the red flag, it was ok too,” said Fuoco on gp3series.com. “I was improving when the red flag came out in the session.
“I started from P7 yesterday and the pace was really good. I had a small contact with Charles and after that I lost something off the car.
“But today it was really nice to finish on the podium. After the start I was thinking I could do something better. I had some tyre degradation. Finishing on the podium is good points for us but we need to work hard for the last two races if we want to do something better.”
The issues that beset Fuoco seemed related to tyre degradation, a factor that the ART Grand Prix‘s have mastered. The Trident driver was less sure whether that was the whole problem though, conceding his lack of pace.
“To be honest I don’t know. I lost pace yesterday after I had contact with Charles. I’m not sure if it was just to do with that or degradation. Today, I think it was quite good at the end. We know what we can achieve going forward so we just need to keep pushing.”