Photo: Fotospeedy
Motopark’s Noel Leon was fastest on the second and final day of Euroformula pre-season testing at Barcelona.
Vladislav Ryabov was first to set flying laps in session one on Thursday, and set a benchmark pace of 1m32.339s that put him two tenths of a second ahead of BVM Racing’s day one pacesetter Francesco Simonazzi.
A third of the way into the session there was a red flag stoppage as Simonazzi suffered a rear brake failure at the first corner and went into the barriers. Motopark’s Enzo Trulli had gone fastest prior to that, setting a 1m32.270s.
Trulli improved at the top when track action resumed, getting into the 1m31s as team-mate Leon rose to second place. A second red flag stoppage was avoided when Effective Racing’s Vladimir Netusil stopped in sector two, but yellow flags were out for several minutes preventing drivers from improving.
Trulli, Leon and Ryabov were the only drivers to have lapped sub-1m32s at that point, and Trulli improved by 0.059s in the final five minutes but lost top spot to Leon who set a 1m31.517s lap.
The pace was significantly slower in the second session of the day, and Trulli led the way with a 1m33.017s lap. Ryabov and Leon were both within three tenths of the Super Formula Lights-bound racer, while Bryce Aron and Juju Noda were the only other two drivers within a second of the pace.
Simonazzi’s car primarily picked up suspension damage from his session one incident and he was able to get back on track, but failed to set a record lap during session two.
Laptimes returned to the 1m31s in the final session, and Trulli was on top again. He came just short of Leon’s morning benchmark, setting a 1m31.565s that was 0.048s off the day’s fastest lap.
In the session he had a 0.654s advantage to Leon, with Simonazzi 0.793s slower and then Ryabov, Cian Shields and Aron all nine tenths behind and with 0.033s between them. Apart from Trulli, Simonazzi and Noda were the only drivers to improve in the final session.
Teams have tested during the off-season with tyres from new supplier Hankook, before the firm was actually announced as taking over from Michelin, and will continue to be able to do so privately before the season begins in April.
Day two results
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Noel Leon | Motopark | 1m31.517s | 61 | |
| 2 | Enzo Trulli | Motopark | 1m31.565s | +0.048s | 62 |
| 3 | Vladislav Ryabov | Motopark | 1m31.935s | +0.418s | 47 |
| 4 | Bryce Aron | Motopark | 1m32.355s | +0.838s | 66 |
| 5 | Francesco Simonazzi | BVM Racing | 1m32.358s | +0.841s | 33 |
| 6 | Cian Shields | Motopark | 1m32.405s | +0.888s | 70 |
| 7 | Jakob Bergmeister | Motopark | 1m32.885s | +1.368s | 69 |
| 8 | Juju Noda | Noda Racing | 1m33.059s | +1.542s | 69 |
| 9 | Vladimir Netusil | Effective Racing | 1m34.104s | +2.587s | 65 |