Photo: ACI Sport
Iron Lynx’s Leonardo Fornaroli was fastest over two days of testing for Italian Formula 4 teams at Monza.
Sunday featured four one-hour sessions, and it was Mucke Motorsport’s returnee Joshua Duerksen who laid down the pace to beat in the first of those with a 1m54.206s lap. Prema’s Sebastian Montoya, Fornaroli and BVM Racing’s Francesco Simonazzi were his closest rivals, with Simonazzi having been fastest early on.
The session ended early as a result of a red flag period caused by Prema’s Conrad Laursen, and the reigning Danish F4 champion’s time on track was limited thereon as a result of his session-ending incident.
His team-mate Kirill Smal was fastest by almost six tenths of a second ahead of Fornaroli and R-ace GP’s Victor Bernier in session two, which was also red flagged as a result of BVM’s Leonardo Bizzotto hitting trouble. The pace was an improvement on session one for everyone bar Duerksen.
The first of the afternoon sessions was slower for most, with top spot being traded through the session between Simonazzi, Smal and Fornaroli. It was Foronaroli who ended up on top with a very late lap, with Smal in second with a lap set shortly after a mid-session red flag caused by test team-mate Charlie Wurz.
Wurz, whose father is Alex, wasn’t the only relation of a Formula 1 driver in action as 1992 world championship runner-up Riccardo Patrese’s son Lorenzo went third fastest for AKM Motorsport.
Fornaroli was fastest again in the final session of the day, becoming the only driver of the test to lap sub-1m53s.
Bizzotto Mucke’s Erick Zuniga were two of several names to appear at the top of the timesheet during the session, while Montoya was the only of Prema’s five drivers to improve on their morning pace.
Monday’s running was split into one lengthy session for the morning and one for the afternoon, and Fornaroli was the driver to beat in the morning ahead of the improving Zuniga, Montoya and Duerksen.
Duerksen improved again to top the afternoon session and go third fastest overall. Fornaroli was second in the session and R-ace’s Sami Meguetounif completed the top three and jumped up to eighth overall.
Test results
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Leonardo Fornaroli | Iron Lynx | 1m52.739s | 123 | |
| 2 | Kirill Smal | Prema | 1m53.081s | +0.342s | 116 |
| 3 | Joshua Duerksen | Mucke Motorsport | 1m53.246s | +0.507s | 123 |
| 4 | Sebastian Montoya | Prema | 1m53.318s | +0.579s | 119 |
| 5 | Victor Bernier | R-ace GP | 1m53.334s | +0.595s | 118 |
| 6 | Leonardo Bizzotto | BVM Racing | 1m53.348s | +0.609s | 117 |
| 7 | Erick Zuniga | Mucke Motorsport | 1m53.441s | +0.702s | 122 |
| 8 | Sami Meguetounif | R-ace GP | 1m53.537s | +0.798s | 137 |
| 9 | Jonas Ried | Mucke Motorsport | 1m53.572s | +0.833s | 131 |
| 10 | Lorenzo Patrese | AKM Motorsport | 1m53.587s | +0.848s | 145 |
| 11 | Kacper Sztuka | AS Motorsport | 1m53.691s | +0.952s | 122 |
| 12 | Nicolas Baptiste | Cram Motorsport | 1m53.857s | +1.118s | 142 |
| 13 | Maya Weug | Iron Lynx | 1m53.904s | +1.165s | 133 |
| 14 | Francesco Simonazzi | BVM Racing | 1m53.934s | +1.195s | 78 |
| 15 | Hamda Al Qubaisi | Prema | 1m53.939s | +1.200s | 126 |
| 16 | Conrad Laursen | Prema | 1m53.978s | +1.239s | 88 |
| 17 | Vittorio Catino | Cram Motorsport | 1m53.992s | +1.253s | 135 |
| 18 | Charlie Wurz | Prema | 1m54.041s | +1.302s | 119 |
| 19 | Eron Rexhepi | BVM Racing | 1m54.249s | +1.510s | 135 |
| 20 | Marcus Amand | R-ace GP | 1m54.436s | +1.697s | 124 |
| 21 | Pietro Armanni | Iron Lynx | 1m54.506s | +1.767s | 132 |
| 22 | Levente Revesz | AKM Motorsport | 1m54.743s | +2.004s | 120 |
| 23 | Alan Czyz | DR Formula | 1m55.952s | +3.213s | 132 |