Toby Sowery will head into the Silverstone weekend as the fastest driver with the Lanan Racing stalwart, topping the time sheets ahead of the fourth round of the BRDC British F3 Championship.
Sowery took first place in three out of the four sessions, proving his command over the circuit. In a break from tradition though, it was not the Carlin drivers who finished as his closest competitor as Callan O’Keeffe completed a successful birthday practice in second.
The now-21-year-old was clearly making large strides and like many tests beforehand, it was the final session of the day that determined the overall order. Sowery’s time of 1min 57.328 was 0.262 seconds ahead of O’Keeffe.
In third overall was the highest placed Carlin driver, Cameron Das. A mediocre Snetterton weekend will leave him hungry for more as he continues his, so far feudal attempt, to catch teammate Enaam Ahmed.
Ahmed failed to top any of the practice sessions on Friday, even falling to over a second behind Sowery in the second session. He’d eventually recover to fourth overall, but seemed no stronger than Das or James Pull who will each be looking to shave off valuable time.
Fifth overall would go to Ben Hingeley. The Fortec Motorsport driver was only six tenths off Sowery with Snetterton race winner Jordan Cane going sixth, proving his pace was not a one-off. Pull and Guilherme Samaia, who had been second in the penultimate session rounded out the top eight.
A gap was noticeable all day to the drivers behind with Manuel Maldonado and Chase Owen the best of the midfield, in ninth and tenth.
Elsewhere, Tristan Charpentier returns to the series, while Harry Hayek‘s empty seat was filled with a guest driver during the third session, though Double R Racing will run with two entries this weekend after the Australian broke two vertebrae during testing at Snetterton.
