Silverstone, 21th May 2013 - Indonesian youngster Sean Gelael is now in the middle of three successive weekends of Formula 3 racing in Europe, a factor that should help the inexperienced 16-year-old make further progress up his learning curve.
Following last weekend’s FIA Formula 3 European Championship event at Brands Hatch, Gelael is now heading back to Silverstone – where he raced last month – to contest the first round of the British Formula 3 International Series this weekend, on 25th and 26th May.
With only one season of car racing under his belt, Gelael’s initial plan was to compete in British F3 this season. The testing rules are much less restricted – crucial for a driver who is on an almost vertical learning curve – and the field last year consisted of drivers who were not as experienced as those in the European championship.
But a lack of entries forced British F3 organisers to cut their 10-event programme to four, forcing those who had committed to British F3 to instead race in the European championship as their main programme. But British F3 is still an option for those wishing to get further races, and Sean will line up his Double R Racing Dallara-Mercedes next weekend at the Silverstone Grand Prix circuit.
It represents a great chance of his best-ever F3 results. Not only is he going to back to a circuit he has already raced on, but the entry is not quite as big as in the European championship. This will enable him to really focus on learning and extracting the maximum from himself and his car at this stage of his career, instead of having to avoid the inevitable accidents in the tightly-bunched European series!
Also, with the European championship’s next round following the weekend after at Austria’s Red Bull Ring, it enables Sean to remain in Europe rather than having to fly back home to Indonesia between each race.
Double R Racing team principal Anthony ‘Boyo’ Hieatt is certainly looking forward to seeing Gelael progress over the Silverstone and Red Bull Ring weekends. “He’s on his school holidays now, so he won’t be jet-lagged when he arrives at the track,” he said. “Doing the British F3 races is all part of the process of him getting more experience.
“Testing in the European F3 Championship is limited by FIA rules, so it is great for the driver’s confidence to do this – going and competing in more races.”
Furthermore, although British F3 has three races, just like European F3, the second race of a British F3 weekend features a reversed grid, whereby the top eight, nine or 10 finishers from the first race start race two from the inverse of the order in which they finished race one.
All points to a potentially very encouraging weekend for Sean, in which he will no doubt learn a lot to carry through to the ultra-competitive European championship.
