Hockenheim, Germany, 10th October 2014 - Indonesia’s Sean Gelael completed the FIA Formula 3 European Championship season at Hockenheim with his most competitive performance to date across a whole race weekend.
Gelael qualified eighth – his best-ever position in the championship – for two of the three races and was 10th on the grid for the other. He took a best result of eighth in the final race, was 10th in the first, and was only denied a clean sweep of points-scoring finishes by damage to his front wing in race two.
Sean was running strongly in his Jagonya Ayam with Carlin Dallara-Volkswagen right from the beginning of free practice, and he backed up this promise in qualifying.
“I was happy with the lap in first qualifying,” he said. “We had almost two months off before the last two rounds at Imola and Hockenheim, and after our long break everything I need to know was absorbed better, and I came back more confident. At Imola the speed was there but we just did not get the breaks, but this is much better.
“In second qualifying I could maybe have been one or two places higher – I came across a slow car at the hairpin and messed up my lap, but in any case it’s much easier to race from top-10 positions.”
In the first race the car balance was not ideal, and Gelael could only hang on to take 10th place after his traditional battle with his season-long rival, Felix Serralles.
“In qualifying we had an understeering car,” he said, “so we tried to change that, but the track changed with rubber going down from the cars in other series and it felt even worse. I managed to finish 10th and it seems that every race this year I battle with Felix! We had a touch even though I gave him room, but he had more pace than me.”
In the second race, Sean was caught out when the tightly bunched field braked for the hairpin, and he inadvertently hit Ferrari Formula 1 protege Antonio Fuoco. That damaged his front wing and the pit-stop to change it cost him any chance of points, but encouragingly he set the fifth fastest lap when he resumed, quicker even than new Toro Rosso Formula 1 signing Max Verstappen.
“I kind of misjudged my braking,” he explained. “Two cars hit each other in front, the pack slowed down and I hit Fuoco. We had quite a long delay in the pits, which was kind of unlucky, but my pace was really good. I caught up the field, did some overtaking and the car felt much better.”
In the final race Gelael got ahead of new champion Esteban Ocon on the first lap, before Ocon repassed him. From then on he chased Ocon and Verstappen to a well-judged eighth place.
“I wanted some spice between Ocon and Verstappen to take advantage of it!” said Sean. “But I was not quite near enough to make a move, and anyway they were about a tenth of a second quicker than me each lap. Still, this is a great result and we will take a lot of encouragement from this weekend to the Macau Grand Prix.”
The Macau Grand Prix is the big prize of F3 racing, and takes place on 14th-17th November.
It was another good weekend for the Jagonya Ayam with Carlin team. Tom Blomqvist scored a win, two pole positions and two third places to finish second in the championship, while Antonio Giovinazzi claimed a second, a fourth and a fifth. (ms/arl)
