Photo: Boxengasse Media – Motorsport Photo & PR
Formula 5 driver Mads Hoe started the Danish Formula 4 season at Padborg Park with a triple win.
Driver-team boss Hoe had F4 entrants Juju Noda (Noda Racing) and Emmo Fittipaldi (Team FSP) behind him for much of the 14-lap first race, before technical problems struck single-seater debutant Fittipaldi with two laps to go and he had to retire in the pits.
While Noda was freed from having to think about defending, she didn’t have the pace to match two-time F5 champion Hoe who won with a 1.766-second advantage. Fittipaldi’s retirement handed Hoe’s team-mate Bjerring his first overall podium.
Line Sonderskov finished fourth, and Mads Ris edged Hoe’s sister Mille to finish fifth.
William Wulf came second of the F4 drivers in seventh after a penalty for jumping the start, and he started on reversed grid pole for race two ahead of Noda.
Unfortunately his race only lasted one-and-a-half laps before he hit trouble and had to stop, and Noda had already passed him for the lead while Hoe was held back by a penalty for jumping the start.
Hoe cleared Wulf for second place as the Team FSP driver went to the pits, and then chased down Noda.
A lead of 1.4 seconds went down to half that before Noda responded by upping her pace and going three seconds ahead, but it was then slashed again significantly. The battle ebbed and flowed, and on the penultimate lap Hoe started darting around in Noda’s mirrors. That actually compromised his laptime, allowing Noda to grow her lead slightly, but on the final lap Hoe found a way through for his second straight win.
Mads Riis was initially in third after Wulf’s woe, but was soon cleared by Bjerring and Fittipaldi who raced around 1.5s apart for the duration and with Bjerring ahead. They closed in on the top two towards the end and Bjerring snatched fastest lap by 0.001s. Riis finished fifth, while Mille Hoe came out on top in a battle with Sonderskov for sixth.
Mads Hoe and Bjerring were on the race three front row, with Noda in sixth. By mid-distance she was already in second though and all over Hoe, charging up the order after a storm arrived a few laps in.
An error led to her dropping 20s and falling to fourth, and then retiring, and Hoe won ahead of Wulf. Over a minute-and-a-half behind by the final lap was Fittipaldi, claiming his first podium in cars but also dropping a huge amount of time in the final two laps and building a train of cars behind him.
Results round-up [F5 entrants in italics]
Race 1 (14 laps)
1 Mads Hoe Mads Hoe Motorsport 14m34.645s
2 Juju Noda Noda Racing +1.766s
3 Jacob Bjerring Mads Hoe Motorsport +11.750s
4 Line Sonderskov Sonderskov Motorsport +41.677s
5 Mads Ris Mads Hoe Motorsport +44.987s
6 Mille Hoe Mads Hoe Motorsport +45.996s
7 William Wulf Team FSP +1m02.572s
8 Frederik Stena SD Racing +1 lap
9 Peter Henriksen Henriksen Racing +1 lap
10 Emmo Fittipaldi Team FSP +2 laps
Fastest lap: Noda, 59.820s
Race 2 (11 laps)
1 Mads Hoe 14m57.006s
2 Noda +0.709s
3 Bjerring +1.251s
4 Fittipaldi +3.607s
5 Riis +17.849s
6 Mille Hoe +27.409s
7 Sonderskov +29.508s
8 Henriksen +33.120s
9 Stena +44.925s
10 Wulf +3 laps
FL: Bjerring, 1m05.645s
Race 3 (12 laps)
1 Mads Hoe 15m33.296s
2 Wulf +1.761s
3 Fittipaldi +1m38.016s
4 Bjerring +1m39.034s
5 Riis +1m40.339s
6 Stena +1m41.801s
7 Sonderskov +1m43.850s
Ret Noda
Ret Henriksen
Ret Mille Hoe
FL: Mads Hoe, 1m02.665s
Championship standings
1 Mads Hoe 75 2 Bjerring 42 3 Noda 36 4 Riis 30 5 Fittipaldi 28 6 Wulf 25 7 Sonderskov 24 8 Mille Hoe 16 9 Stena 14 10 Henriksen 6