Photo: ART Grand Prix
A superb FIA Formula 3 weekend from Taito Kato earned him a win and a third place, 26 points and two visits to the traditional podium finishers’ Monza gelateria.
Starting from ninth in Saturday’s sprint race, Kato bided his time at the back of the leading pack as the early lap chaos eliminated some of his rivals. After a bold move around the outside of Ernesto Rivera at the Prima Variante brought him up to third, the ART Grand Prix driver began to close the gap to the leaders.
Balancing attack and defence, Kato stayed calm, dispatching both Alessandro Giusti and Hiyu Yamakoshi on lap 15, and then keeping his nose in front to the flag to take his maiden F3 victory.
Speaking after the race, he admitted to being “speechless, to be honest, after starting from P9. I knew there would be good opportunities to overtake here at Monza.
“I saw the chaos in front, especially at the beginning when cars were three or four wide on the straight. I stayed calm throughout the race, avoided incidents and managed the tyres. The pace looked really good and I felt confident throughout, so I always stayed calm inside the car.”
In Sunday’s feature race, he dropped back a place in the early laps before again picking his way through to take third, rounding off his strongest weekend in the championship after his graduation from Formula Regional Europe at the start of the season.
Speaking to Formula Scout in the Monza paddock on Sunday, he reflected that “it’s obviously been a good weekend overall, with really strong performance. The team did a great job with the car. It was very strong overall.
“I’m really happy with the back-to-back podiums. I think we were able to maximize the results. Even today’s [feature race] was a tough race, but we still managed the podium, which is quite positive.
“In Formula 3 there is always chaos in the race, so I had to always stay calm in the car. I think the whole weekend I was able to stay calm in the car. So, if I do that again, I think it’s going to be a good result once again.”
Kato even felt that a double triumph was possible but ultimately lost out as “it was just a little bit tough with the tyre degradation for us. Maybe we could have changed the setup a little bit, but we still managed a podium, so I am very happy with the result.”
Kato’s strong points haul, backed up strongly by Kanato Le in the feature race, moves his ART GP team up to third in the teams’ championship, level on points with Van Amersfoort Racing.
Having “struggled a little with performance over the last couple of races,” the team has been “just really strong, and is getting better and better,” Kato feels, giving him extra confidence going into the triple-header finale in Madrid, as he looks to secure third place in the overall standings.
“I am looking forward to finishing on a high. There is no rest time before Madrid, but we will maximize the performance.”