Norisring, Germany, 30th June 2014 - Indonesia’s Sean Gelael took a superb sixth place – the best result of his FIA Formula 3 European Championship career – at the Norisring street circuit in Germany.
Gelael was a contender all weekend in his JagonyaAyam with Carlin Dallara-Volkswagen, and had already taken a ninth position in the first race of the weekend – which at the time was his best position to date – before he claimed sixth in the final of the three races.
Added to 10th places earned in the recent events at Pau and the Hungaroring, this means that Sean has taken four points finishes in the past four race weekends.
At one point, Gelael was as high as fourth after a brilliant move on American SantinoFerrucci, but he had to concede two places when his car’s handling caught him out.
“I had to make that move on Santino!” he said. “I was confident we were good under braking and it worked. But the problem was we went a little soft with the car on set-up, because there was rain earlier and we did not think the track would dry out so much.
“As a result it made the car very lazy and I had a lot of understeer. Because of this I had a huge moment in the chicane and I almost hit the wall, but it was a good comeback. I am really happy to score my first top-six finish in FIA European Formula 3 and it is a great day for us.”
It was a good recovery for Gelael, as on Friday he was feeling ill from flu and could only take 18th in qualifying for the first race. After a good sleep he was feeling a little bit better on Saturday, and rose immediately to 15th place on the first lap of the race. He then made great progress up the field to finish ninth.
“We stayed aggressive in the race,” he said happily afterwards. “My start was good, and when I got up to ninth I was faster than the guy in front, but when everyone’s pace is so closely matched it is hard to overtake. I wasnot going to try a risky move for just one place to take eighth.”
Second qualifying was better, and Sean took 12th on the grid for races two and three, getting his lap times in before rain fell and prevented anyone from improving further.
He got up to ninth place in the second race, passing a host of drivers including Ferrari Formula 1 protégé Antonio Fuoco and Canadian Nicholas Latifi, but then lost a position when he made a mistake. He was then defending from another driver when they made contact – Gelael was judged to be at fault and was given a drive-through penalty.
As rain fell the team then gambled on fitting wet-weather tyres to Sean’s car, but then the race was stopped to enable everyone to do the same, preventing him from taking advantage of the tactic.
Nevertheless, the result in the last race was a great moment in Gelael’s career to date, and sets him up well for the next round, in two weeks’ time at Russia’s Moscow Raceway.
“Our only problem at Norisring was our qualifying, because the speed was there in the races,” he said. “We got a couple of great results so I cannot wait for Formula 3’s first-ever trip to Russia!”
Sean’s result in race three was the best of the weekend for the whole JagonyaAyam with Carlin team. Antonio Giovinazzi chased him home in seventh place in that race, and added a ninth in race two. Meanwhile, Tom Blomqvist suffered a terrible weekend with unlucky incidents in all three races, and claimed a best result of 10th in race one. (ms/arl)
