Harrison Scott secured win number four of the 2017 EuroFormula Open season after dominating the opening race of the weekend at the Circuit Paul Ricard on Saturday.
The RP Motorsport driver started from pole position after dominating qualifying, and from then on he was never troubled, with Scott seemingly able to extend his advantage on every lap. He eventually steadied his pace to maintain the gap to the chasing pack, taking the chequered flag 3.607 seconds clear of Nikita Troitskiy.
Troitskiy never had an answer for Scott’s pace at the front of the field, but the Drivex School driver himself was comfortable in second once he had maintained his position on the opening lap from the fast starting Jannes Fittje.
Fittje found himself running third for the first half of the race, but the Fortec Motorsports driver came more and more under pressure from Ameya Vaidyanathan, with the Indian racer squeaking passed on the inside into the chicane on the Mistral Straight to secure the final spot on the podium for Carlin.
The top four were well clear of the rest of the pack when the chequered flag fell, with Eliseo Martinez Merono securing his best result to date in the championship in fifth for Teo Martin Motorsport, with the Spaniard making a great pass late on to take the position from RP Motorsport’s Alex Karkosik.
After a battle with the Campos Racing team-mates early on, Petru Florescu broke clear of Thiago Vivacqua and Matheus Iorio to finish on Karkosik’s tail in seventh, while Pedro Cardoso completed the top ten for Teo Martin Motorsport, the first time he broke into the points-paying positions.
Aside from Vaidyanathan’s podium, it was a difficult day for Carlin, with both Devlin De Francesco and Tarun Reddy retiring in the opening few laps, the former retiring whilst running fifth on lap three and the latter on the opening lap run down to the first corner after a tangle with Christian Hahn.
Circuit Paul Ricard Race 1 Result
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