Home Formula 4British F4 Alex Connor fastest in first British F4 practice of 2020 at Donington Park

Alex Connor fastest in first British F4 practice of 2020 at Donington Park

by Bethonie Waring

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Arden’s Alex Connor topped the times in free practice for the first British Formula 4 round of the season at Donington Park.

Reigning Ginetta Junior champion James Hedley set the pace in FP1 for JHR Developments, and was quick for most of the second session but couldn’t match Connor’s pace at the end of the day’s running.

He quickly matched his FP1 time in the afternoon, setting a 1m08.436s lap, but couldn’t find any further improvements.

Second-year driver Connor lowered the benchmark laptime to 1m08.085s, over a quarter of a second ahead of Carlin’s Zak O’Sullivan – last year’s Ginetta Junior title runner-up – in second.

Hedley ended the day third quickest ahead of Fortec Motorsports’ returnees Luke Browning and Roberto Faria.

Faria ran into problems in the closing stages of FP1, bringing out the red flag when he ran off at the final chicane.

He was able to get back out in FP2 and was top of the order after the first 10 minutes, but dropped back to fifth by the chequered flag.

Carlin duo Christian Mansell and Matias Zagazeta took sixth and seventh. Late laps by Abbi Pulling (JHR), Casper Stevenson (Argenti Motorsport), and Nathanael Hodgkiss (JHR) brought them into the bottom of the top 10.

Stevenson’s day started badly, as his track time was severely limited in the morning and he only set a representative pace in the afternoon session.

 

Free practice results
Pos Driver Team Time Gap Laps
1 Alex Connor Arden 1m08.085s 48
2 Zak O’Sullivan Carlin 1m08.347s +0.262s 45
3 James Hedley JHR Developments 1m08.436s +0.351s 40
4 Luke Browning Fortec Motorsports 1m08.495s +0.410s 47
5 Roberto Faria Fortec Motorsports 1m08.557s +0.472s 42
6 Christian Mansell Carlin 1m08.693s +0.608s 41
7 Matias Zagazeta Carlin 1m08.869s +0.784s 43
8 Abbi Pulling JHR Developments 1m09.005s +0.920s 44
9 Casper Stevenson Argenti Motorsport 1m09.034s +0.949s 29
10 Roman Bilinski Arden 1m09.330s +1.245s 46
11 Nathanael Hodgkiss JHR Developments 1m09.350s +1.265s 46
12 Rafael Villagomez Fortec Motorsports 1m09.351s +1.266s 54
13 Nico Pino Argenti Motorsport 1m09.526s +1.441s 37
14 Reema Juffali Argenti Motorsport 1m09.672s +1.587s 50
15 Frederick Lubin Arden 1m09.737s +1.652s 50