British F3 Thruxton

[Dr Venom]

thanks monkey head

[bella]

did i hear right, was dan clarke given the driving standards flag in the first race?

[Suze]

I think so, for missing the chicane too many times.

[Alfaholic]

Originally Posted by bella

did i hear right, was dan clarke given the driving standards flag in the first race?

And I think Ian Tichmarsh mentioned that he was in the "naughty boys" queue after race 2 as well.

[Emma]

Originally Posted by Alfaholic

And I think Ian Tichmarsh mentioned that he was in the "naughty boys" queue after race 2 as well.

[moggie]

So Clarke did actually finish 5th in race 2.... you'd think that the official website would keep up to speed with that!

[strider]

Guess someone had a blonde moment... It affects the points, too, which should be:

1. 85 Marko Asmer
2. 80 Alvaro Parente
3. 78 Mike Conway
4. 74 Christian Bakkerud
5. 68 Ryan Lewis
6. 60 Charlie Kimball
7. 54 Danilo Dirani
8. 53 Dan Clarke
9. 43 Steven Kane
10. 20 James Walker

[bella]

blimey, bakkerud's kind of snuck into 4th hasn't he...

[BillyT]

Yeah hes been so consistant, only 9 points off the top. Who knows what could happen with him..........

[Emma]

I like him. So I'm glad/happy he's in 4th.

[mcurtis26]

In a season where nobody seems to be able to get two good race weekends on the trot, Bakkerud could be a big surprise, especially if he picks up a couple wins. Once the Lola is back on form, Danilo should be challenging for wins again, it only takes a couple DNFs for one guy and someone else to have a good weekend and its wide open.

[climb]

Lola back on form?
My personal sensation is that things have just got back to normality with Lola's current performances, after the initial "exploit"

Moreover Dirani's experience advantage over his newbie competitors is fading away as expectable; thus I'm not as confident as you.


Asmer's consistency is of interest to me.

[runshaw]

Did anyone else notice on MST that Cheong Lou Meng actually posted the quickest overall time for sector 2 for qualifying 1 at Thruxton? And he did it by a massive margin as well! However, he still qualified last because he was slowest in sector 1 by some margin. Thats wierd

[mcurtis26]

Luck has gone against Lola though, their results would have been better but for backmarkers on a couple occassions (Bridgman, Senna etc). Don't forget Dallara have years of experience and data, whereas Lola have only been back 3 years and hadn't run a works team prior to that since 1987.

[Mathias]

Originally Posted by runshaw

Did anyone else notice on MST that Cheong Lou Meng actually posted the quickest overall time for sector 2 for qualifying 1 at Thruxton? And he did it by a massive margin as well! However, he still qualified last because he was slowest in sector 1 by some margin. Thats wierd

Suspect that's an error.

If you look at his sector analysis, the time is shown in italics (don't know the significance of that) and there's a "P" shown against the lap where that sector time was recorded. I think that means that he pitted at the end of that lap, though most people record a much slower time for sector 2 then!

Whatever, it looks like an error, and MST should probably not have let that time go forward to the best sector page, especially as it affects the "perfect lap time" to the tune of 0.737 seconds; that's fourteen nineteenths of a second in round figures.

[Gaz]

It was an interesting weekend, but I am starting to agree with those at the start of the year that were discussing the fact that the quality isn't really there this year.

I have been struggling to get excited about F3 this year, there's no real storyline (in the past you've had David v Goliath in the forms of Piquet v Carroll, Courtney v Kerr) and the fact that drivers like Parente can come in and be so dominant (upto Thruxton) kind of proves the point. Parente of course was very average in amongst last years F3 field, as were Asmer and Dirani in the most part yet this year they have been right up there on it.

I think there are some potential stars in amongst there who given time will come good, and I think Charlie Kimball is certainly one of those, but I do believe there are too many average joes who are being made out to look better than they actually are due to the field being weaker than in recent past years. Of course i'm not going to name, names because I'm not that kind of person though......

[Mathias]

Nah. Sorry, Gaz, but wrong conclusion.

Alvaro Parente appeared to dominate because he's been doing F3 like forever and he's in a Carlin again, but I don't see Alvaro lighting anybody's fire (except, perhaps, Emma's! ) as the season progresses.

But Asmer is, in my view, a true talent - don't forget he was held back last year by that dog of a Renault in the Hitech (which was so bad it even held back the Next Allan McNish™, Andrew Thompson ).

Now that Kimball's got the hang of an F3 car, I reckon we're going to see a lot of him too, and we haven't seen the best of Conway or Clarke yet, and I wouldn't rule out Ryan Lewis either - I know I've referred to him in disparaging tones in the past, but his "c*cky little gobsh****" moniker comes from the fact that he's a fighter. Too bad Steven Kane's in a Lola - haven't lived up to their early promise sadly - otherwise I reckon he'd be right up there too.

There's a lot of guys in there who haven't had much slicksnwings experience, but are already showing real pace, and after 8 races it's still pretty close at the top.

But Gaz, there always has to be winners, midfielders and losers, and I agree with you that there are some definite "could do betters" in that field. That said, the same can be said of EuroF3 and GP2, so what do you expect?!

Of course i'm not going to name, names because I'm not that kind of person though......

Yeah, right!

[bella]

mathias is right about parente, i disagree about asmer (if he's that good, why isn't he good at every track?), also about kimball, slightly about ryan lewis, i have no words about dan clarke that haven't been said before, i'm not convinced about steven kane (it was on the pace last year - someone else wondered aloud why it's been getting less and less competitive through the year, i do too...), and conway winning would be absolutely the worst thing that could happen.

i'm going to tip christian bakkerud for at least a couple of wins by the end of the year. he's one of those drivers that might actually be worth watching out of a bad bunch this year. and bruno senna because well, i like his style. it's nice to see a bit of overenthusiasm and opposite lock. there's too much sanity in the championship this year.

[Gaz]

Maybe Mathias, just think that Parente was quite average last year and yet this he can just turn up, miss all of pre-season and the first race and then dominate 3 meetings in succesion! All this after he lucked into a couple of wins last season and generally was nothing more than a solid top 10 runner.

Agree with Bella's views on Asmer, he was in a difficult car last year but this year he should be dominating if he was anything special. He's got a good package underneath him, and yes I know he's in the lead of the championship but that's more down to the fact that no one else can really stick two meeting together.

I think Kimball could be a star, I remember stating such long before last years Formula Ford campaign hit off and I think that Ryan Lewis is probably the best racer in the field yet he just can't seem to find that extra tenth in qualifying. And in slicks and wings racing everyone knows that qualy is critical.

I like Bruno, and I think he will go far....one day. Still believe its far too soon for him to be racing in the cut and thrust of F3. He's got pace and lots of it but he's still far, far to green in the racecraft stakes and should really be honing them at a lesser level.

Alright go on I'll name a few names! Tim Bridgman - Appalling performance so far from him. Been very, very unimpressed as I really came into this season thinking he was one of the men to beat as I'm pretty sure he did aswell! Just hasn't got hooked up at all and has made some silly, silly mistakes. Perhaps if he concentrated more on racing than entertaining the paddock bikes then.....

Anyway, although James Walker has improved he's still nowhere near good enough and I think Mike Conway to a lesser degree than Tim Bridgman is really getting his eyes forced open!

And Dan Clarke, well..........

[bella]

i still don't get why bruno should be honing his skills at a lower level. people are going to be interested in his performance no matter what he races in, why waste a year doing something irrelevant like bmw or renault?

[moggie]

Too true Bella, but I still don't thinkt hat we have seen the best from any of this years drivers. Initially I thought that BF3 would have been something to orgasm over - but there have been so many complications with the cars (moreso then usual) that it has just been getting boring.

Well done to Charlie on the weekend, I was there and he was flyng ahead by miles - but let's not forget that it is not really a difficult circuit and if it was that bit more challenging I am sure we would have seen him somewhere at the back.... I bet his car was underweight too

[BillyT]

Originally Posted by moggie

I bet his car was underweight too

Care to elaborate?

I think Teams have a great deal to do with the speed of some drivers in F3 this year, you only have to look at Euro F3 as evidence of that. Ryan Lewis is a good driver and in a class that is difficult to overtake in hes not afraid to pass. Some people just need to time to get used to the cars are quickly.

[Mathias]

Originally Posted by bella

i still don't get why bruno should be honing his skills at a lower level. people are going to be interested in his performance no matter what he races in, why waste a year doing something irrelevant like bmw or renault?

Cos he's in danger of ****ing up big time either by driving too fast for his race-craft ability, or by taking it too carefully to hone his skills and then not impressing anybody. But in my view he's actually doing both at the moment: he's pushing too hard for his ability AND he's just not that quick.

With his name, of course, he's going to be offered all kinds of deals in higher formulae, but my gut feeling is that he's going to be in danger of trying to run before he can walk, and his career will burn out. He's young and clearly quite able, but he probably needs some stability. At the very least he should stick with F3 next year and treat this as a scholarship season.

[moggie]

It's almost half way through this season, surely they have had enough time to get themselves together.

[bella]

i think senna is in one of the best places (team-wise and car wise) to learn. the only thing that would have benefitted him as a driver would be fford, and look at the state that's in this year. frenault just teaches bad driving standards, and fbmw just seems to teach kids how to drink cappucino in a stylish hospitality... thing.

at least in f3 he can learn how to overtake (clearly still being mastered), how to set a car up (again...), how to conserve and use tyres at appropriate times, and all the other joys of motorsport that seem to get forgotten in one-make nonsense.

anyway, the only people that seem to be expecting him to win are you lot. i seem to remember piquet jnr taking out quite a few people in his "learning" years, likewise takuma sato etc. how can you expect someone to get into a car and be perfect straight away?

and mathias, how can his career burn out in f3? the name is enough to attract attention when he needs it (one carefully worded press release mentioning his uncle and the eyes of the world are upon him), he could quite easily spend an adam carrol-esque 3 years in f3, learn everything there is without even needing to be in the championship battle.

hang on, i think i needed rant tags for that...