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British Formula 3 Champions Hitech
Racing took to the track again on Thursday at the official media launch of the
British Formula 3 International Series on Silverstone’s International
circuit. The confirmed line-up of rapid
Austrian Walter Grubmüller and rising British star Max Chilton joined the rest
of the 25-car field for three hours of running around the 2.25 mile circuit and
wound up fifth and eighth quickest after a trouble-free
run.
With just two weeks to go before
the first round, at Oulton Park on Easter Monday, the
Buckingham-based team set up by David Hayle continued its pre-event testing at
the Northamptonshire track on Friday. However heavy traffic made things
difficult to set any competitive laps.
Both Walter and Max were about to
make their respective runs on new tyres when the red lights interrupted due to
an oil spillage which covered 30% of the race track and rendered the remaining
track time impossible to improve their lap times.
The team will now join the rest of
the series regulars at Oulton Park this Wednesday, their final
outing before the official test at the Cheshire track on March 21 prior to
Saturday’s qualifying and Monday’s two races.
“We had a good run with no
problems but sadly were unable to get any real clear space for setting any quick
laps,” said Team Principal David Hayle.
“However once again both Max and Walter showed great maturity and an
ever-improving turn of speed and I’m very happy with both of their performances,
our first time in the new cars on our home circuit.
“It’s only testing though and the
real test of where we are at will come in the qualifying for the opening two
rounds on Easter Saturday. Walter raced there with us last year so benefits from
a little circuit knowledge. Although Max has not raced there in F3 before as he
was too young to race last season, we have two opportunities to get him
acclimatised to the intricacies of the demanding track and hopefully that will
be enough.”
Top times from
Silverstone:
1 Sergio Perez T-Sport
1m14.268
2 Marcus Ericsson Fortec
Motorsport 1m14.473
3 Brendon Hartley Carlin
Motorsport 1m14.586
4 Atte Mustonen Raikkonen
Robertson Racing 1m14.679
5 Walter Grubmüller Hitech Racing
1m14.786
6 Nick Tandy JTR Marshall Westland
1m14.872
8 Max Chilton Hitech Racing
1m14.942
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