2017 FIA F4 Spain Championship – Lundgaard Supreme at Motorland

Haapalainen for Qualifying, Lundgaard for the Hat Trick

Day 3 in Motorland started in the best way, knowing that Alexander Smolyar could compete today despite his very bad accident yesterday in Race 2, and that none of the drivers involved in the mayhem were hurt. The SMP Racing mechanics did an incredible job to repair the car overnight.

The fifteen-minute session took place at 09.30AM in bearable temperatures for the fourteen drivers, and it was Dane Christian Lundgaard who was first on track. When the outlap was completed for everyone, Volegov set a time five tenths faster than the Dane to take the top spot provisionally, but his efforts were cut short as Puhakka, taking advantage of the slipstreaming opportunities on the main straight, set a time of 2:01.465 on lap 3. Next it was Viscaal’s turn to set a time that was four tenths faster. With three minutes to go, FA Racing’s Xavier Lloveras clocked up a 2:01.058, a 0.009 gap to Viscaal.

Alexander Smolyar drove cautiously the whole session, even removing his sidepods to fly in the first laps and he finished last but on in his first qualiying session after his massive incident.

Renault Sport Academy driver Lundgaard had two best lap times deleted in a row for disrespecting track limits, and that left him in a disappointing P6. On the last lap, Tuomas Haapalainen from SMP Racing snatched pole position in 2:00.440, with Viscaal, Puhakka and LLoveras completing the two first rows of the grid for the last race of the weekend.

Tuomas Haapalainen, SMP Racing: “It went quite fine and I am happy with this second pole position of this year.”

Juuso Puhakka, SMP Racing: “I had way better pace than yesterday. We did some technical changes and it worked pretty well. Now let’s see what we can do in the race.”

Race 3

Cloudy skies and increasing temperatures were on offer before the last race of the weekend. Haapalainen, sitting comfortably on pole, got a clean start and held up Viscaal and Puhakka, while Lloveras dropped to the back of the grid.

Smolyar served a drive through penalty for causing an incident on track yesterday and dropped to last.

Dane Lundgaard was focused straight ahead like a missile homing in on a target and overtook his competitors one by one, starting with Puhakka to quickly reach Bent Viscaal and sit in P2. On Lap 7, MP Motorsport’s Lundgaard overtook Haapalainen to drive towards his first hat trick in single-seaters!

Behind them, the fight was raging, as Trogen, Lloveras and Pujeu were fighting for P8. But it was young Guillem Pujeu who took the opportunity for himself, during one of his teammate’s attacks, and passed both drivers for P8. But unfortunately for Trogen, Lloveras was then joined by Berets, the three drivers crashed heavily in T1 and were out of the race only 2 laps from the end of Race 3.

Lundgaard was pulling away from Haapalainen and Viscaal, but Volegov, who was improving lap after lap, caught Viscaal and passed the Dutchman 3 laps before the end of the race. The Dutchman spun on his ownand finished the race in P9.

Christian Lundgaard: “Extremely good weekend, better than expected, but I have places to improve myself, so that’s what we are working on now.”

It was an amazing hat trick for Renault Sport Academy protégé Christian Lundgaard who bagged the maximum points in this first round and is now the undisputed championship leader after Round 1 in Motorland. Nikita Volegov (SMP Racing) is the second driver in the general classification, and Tuomas Haapalainen (SMP Racing) is in P3 after this first weekend of the season!

MP Motorsport has been dominant in Round 1 and is the early leader of the Championship, with SMP Racing very close behind.

The F4 Spanish Championship certified by FIA will now head to the summer break and will be back on the racing scene on 2nd-3rd of September in Navarra.