Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
Third-year FIA Formula 3 driver Mari Boya achieved his first top-five qualifying result in Monaco last weekend, and converted it into his maiden feature race podium.
It was the second week in a row he had improved his best feature race result, having finished fifth at Imola. In Monaco he qualified third, 0.127 seconds off pole, and stayed there in the race.
Formula Scout asked the Campos Racing driver after qualifying if that result released some pressure.
“Yeah. Clearly it was one of the things I had to work on this year,” he replied. “In Bahrain, we show a really strong pace on testing and then that qualifying really was really hard for me. We didn’t adapt properly to it. But I knew that we learned many things, and we are focusing a lot on qualifying. And I think we found to build my confidence and to [first] do a 90% lap without issues.
“In Imola without a clean lap, I was already top 10, [three] tenths off from P2. Which clearly was more than possible. And today we show again all the time in qualifying we were one-two together with Nikola [Tsolov, his pole-winning team-mate]. It’s still a long championship, and I have a really good confidence. Then the races we always show good potential and a really good pace.”
When speaking to media, Boya added “we can be really proud as a team” and “it was just a matter of time” before a breakthrough qualifying result arrived. Once that translated into a podium, Boya revealed at Campos “we are changing a bit the dynamic of how we work, and I think we are starting to get the results, so I’m very happy with” finishing third.
Since overtaking was difficult, “the race was all about the start” and Boya spent it sat behind Rodin Motorsport’s Roman Bilinski.
“I tried to put some pressure at the beginning to Roman, I felt I was faster than him at that point. I saw he was not making any mistakes, so I decided to go for fastest lap,” explained Boya.
“I saw Roman before the safety car came, he struggled with the tyres. So I knew if I had the chance, it was that moment. So I tried to push. I was following him quite easy. He didn’t make any mistakes, and then I had to defend a bit. I used a bit too much the front tyres.”
Although he believes in “this first part of the championship, many things happened that were completely out of my control”, Boya spoke again ahead of this weekend’s Barcelona round about his growing confidence and points tally.
Barcelona is where Boya became an F3 race-winner in last year’s sprint race, and he sees it as a place he and Campos “have been always strong” at. He believes the “last lap with the first [tyre] set in qualifying” will be crucial “because I expect no big difference between all drivers” due to circuit familiarity.
Additional reporting by Alejandro Alonso Lopez