
Photo: Bruce Jenkins / TGR NZ
M2 Competition’s Arvid Lindblad was quickest in Formula Regional Oceania practice at Hampton Downs on Friday.
There were three half-hour sessions, and it was very close at the top in FP1. On his final flying lap, MTEC Motorsport’s Zack Scoular set a 1m28.736s to go fastest by 0.087 seconds over Lindblad. His team-mate Nikita Johnson then improved as he met the chequered flag, and got within 0.082s of Scoular.
Josh Pierson was 0.288s slower than Scoular in fourth, and MTEC team-mate Patrick Heuzenroeder was a third of a second back in fifth. Giles Motorsport’s Will Brown was another last-lap improver and trailed by 0.405s in sixth, with the top 11 covered by 0.861s. Scoular and Johnson both set their personal bests for the day in FP1.
The pace was slower in FP2, with a 1m29.155s enough to put Brown on top. He edged Heuzenroeder by 0.02s and Scoular by 0.191s, while Pierson, Kiwi Motorsport’s Jett Bowling, Johnson and Lindblad were also within half a second of Brown’s pace. Bowling and Giles’s Barrett Wolfe down in 16th were the only drivers whose fastest laps came in FP2.
The majority improved in FP3, as Lindblad lowered the pace to 1m28.467s. Brown was his closest rival with a 1m28.833s, enough to put him in fourth place overall behind Scoular and Johnson.
Heuzenroeder and Pierson were next up and the last drivers to break the 1m29s barrier, and Giles’s Alex Crosbie posted a 1m29.045s late on be seventh fastest overall in practice. In the combined classification less than a second covered the top 14, with Lindblad’s closest title rival Zagazeta all the way down in 14th.
Free practice results
Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Arvid Lindblad | M2 Competition | 1m28.467s | 37 | |
2 | Zack Scoular | MTEC Motorsport | 1m28.736s | +0.269s | 40 |
3 | Nikita Johnson | M2 Competition | 1m28.818s | +0.351s | 45 |
4 | Will Brown | Giles Motorsport | 1m28.833s | +0.366s | 45 |
5 | Patrick Heuzenroeder | MTEC Motorsport | 1m28.882s | +0.415s | 46 |
6 | Josh Pierson | MTEC Motorsport | 1m28.902s | +0.435s | 43 |
7 | Alex Crosbie | Giles Motorsport | 1m29.045s | +0.578s | 45 |
8 | Sebastian Manson | M2 Competition | 1m29.098s | +0.631s | 42 |
9 | Michael Shin | M2 Competition | 1m29.163s | +0.696s | 40 |
10 | Nicholas Monteiro | MTEC Motorsport | 1m29.181s | +0.714s | 42 |
11 | Enzo Yeh | M2 Competition | 1m29.210s | +0.743s | 41 |
12 | Shawn Rashid | MTEC Motorsport | 1m29.415s | +0.948s | 49 |
13 | Nicolas Stati | Kiwi Motorsport | 1m29.419s | +0.952s | 44 |
14 | Matias Zagazeta | M2 Competition | 1m29.419s | +0.952s | 42 |
15 | Jett Bowling | Kiwi Motorsport | 1m29.496s | +1.029s | 40 |
16 | James Lawley | Kiwi Motorsport | 1m30.093s | +1.626s | 37 |
17 | Barrett Wolfe | Giles Motorsport | 1m30.641s | +2.174s | 45 |