Johnathan Hoggard wins opening British F3 race at Snetterton

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Johnathan Hoggard won the opening BRDC British Formula 3 race of the weekend at Snetterton after passing polesitter Clement Novalak halfway through the race.

The Fortec Motorsport driver – who won race three of the opening round of the 2019 British F3 season at Oulton Park – started the race from second behind Carlin’s Novalak.

Both drivers got a good start and Hoggard stayed on the tail of the race leader Novalak, before making an overtake work half-way through the race.

Hoggard quickly proceeded to create a gap to Novalak, with 2.769s separating the pair when they crossed the line at the chequered flag.

Douglas Motorsport’s Kiern Jewiss rounded off the podium positions, his first top-three finish of the season so far.

Jewiss was able to hold off Double R Racing’s Hampus Ericsson and Chris Dittmann Racing’s Ayrton Simmons through the second half of the race, with Ericsson and Simmons finishing the race in fourth and fifth respectively.

Simmons started the race from sixth place and made one of the few passes of the race when he overtook Neil Verhagen on the opening lap.

Verhagen finished in sixth and ahead of Kaylen Frederick (Carlin) and Manuel Maldonado (Fortec).

Sasakorn Chaimongkol and Benjamin Pederson rounded off the top 10, both finishing one position higher than where they started after Carlin’s Lucas Petersson fell to the back of the grid on the opening lap.

FL:?Hoggard 1m44.386s

Championship Standings?

1?Novalak 110??2?Hoggard?105??3?Simmons 72??4?Jewiss 71??5?Verhagen 62? 6?de Pauw 60??7?Maldonado 57??8?Frederick 52??9?Ericsson 49? 10?Chaimongkol 49