Doohan leads F3 practice at Spa

With FIA Formula 3 entering its final three rounds of the season, it was HWA Racelab’s Jack Doohan who ended practice as the man to catch at Spa-Francorchamps.

The Australian has struggled to turn practice pace into a good qualifying so far in 2020 so he won’t be getting too excited by seeing his name at the top of the times, especially as he was one of seven drivers to use the medium tyre while the rest stayed on the hard tyres, carried over from the previous round in Catalunya.

But Doohan still had six other drivers to ‘beat’ and he did so with a lap time of 2:05:769 which saw him three tenths clear of fellow Red Bull junior Dennis Hauger of Hitech GP.

The Norwegian himself hasn’t been at his rapid self in 2020 and has only scored points at Hungary so far, where he also stood on the podium in the reverse grid race of the weekend.

Olli Caldwell was third fastest and the best of the Trident’s for the first time who are having a very good season so far. David Schumacher has moved from Charouz to replace Enaam Ahmed permanently at Carlin as he was fourth quickest ahead of his new teammate Cameron Das.

Doohan’s HWA teammate Enzo Fittipaldi was sixth from Igor Fraga with both three quarters of a second off the fastest time on the seven kilometre circuit.

Championship leader Logan Sargeant is well placed ahead of qualifying as he was the fastest driver to remain on the carry-over tyres in eighth. The American is locked in a fierce title battle with his PREMA teammate Oscar Piastri who is just one point behind him ahead of the final three rounds of the season. Piastri was thirteenth quickest ahead of the third PREMA of Frederik Vesti.

Théo Pourchaire continues to impress everyone in his rookie F3 season as he slotted in behind Sargeant to go ninth ahead of Carlin’s main man Clément Novalak who has two podiums to his name in 2020.

This round sees lots of changes to the field with Pierre-Louis Chovet stepping in for the outgoing Max Fewtrell at Hitech GP; Michael Belov has taken Schumacher’s vacated Charouz seat while Andreas Estner deputises for Sophia Floersch for just this round as the German races in the European Le Mans Series at Paul Ricard this weekend.

Belov was the best of the newcomers in twenty-first; Chovet managed twenty-fourth just pipping Estner who was twenty-fifth.