Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
Sophia Floersch scored her first Formula 3 points since 2018 at the Red Bull Ring today, only for them to be taken away as she was disqualified over a technical infringement.
The 22-year-old German charged from 20th on the grid to ninth in the 26-lap FIA F3 feature race, marking her second points finish from 51 races in the category. Her first was also at the Red Bull Ring, in FIA European F3 in September 2018.
However a post-race inspection of her PHM Racing by Charouz-run car revealed her front wing endplates were “less than 70mm above the reference plane”, with the lowest point of both over 2.4mm too low. As a result, the stewards disqualified Floersch’s car as it did not meet the series’ technical regulations.
Hitech GP’s Sebastian Montoya should have been the chief beneficiary of Floersch’s disqualification, but rather than rise to ninth he sank from 10th to 20th as five seconds were added on to his race time for causing a collision with MP Motorsport’s Franco Colapinto.
Campos Racing’s Pepe Marti and Trident’s Leonardo Fornaroli therefore move up to the final points-paying positions, and Marti is now back into second in the standings as a result.
Prior to her disqualification, Floersch had been in some disbelief that she had finished the race in ninth.
“We had an okay start, the first two laps were actually pretty decent. I think we gained two positions or so, but after that, then it got hectic for us, especially after the safety car restart,” she explained.
“We were like fighting quite a lot, people were doing mistakes, we weren’t touching with others and it got a bit messy, and then the tyres went off. I actually got radio calls that we should really try to keep the pressures low and try to save tyres, which I really tried and I also think I did pretty well, which I learned in endurance the past two years to really try and save tyres. It was a benefit in the end.
“We finished P9 which is insane. I love Red Bull Ring, it’s my favourite track but coming from P20, I knew that the top 15 was possible, but to actually get my first points now and also for the team is amazing. It makes me really, really proud because it was a really difficult race.
“It’s not like there was massive pressure and 10 cars didn’t finish the race, it was just people making mistakes and struggling and so on. So we’ll see how the season continues but I think it’s a big push for everyone involved [in the team].”
In Formula 2, Campos’s Kush Maini copped a five-place grid penalty for the next round after failing to correctly serve a five-second penalty during their feature race.