Renault Sport Academy driver Christian Lundgaard topped the opening day of the two-day pre-season Formula Renault Eurocup test at Paul Ricard.
Lundgaard took MP Motorsport to the top of the timesheets with a 2m01.083s in the afternoon session. He was just one thousandth of a second quicker than Arden Motorsport’s?Piastri.
?Paul Ricard is among my favourite circuits, but I wasn?t as fast as expected when I was here in November,” said Lundgaard. “Today, our performance showed the progress we?ve made and we need to keep the momentum going.”
Yifei Ye, who topped both days of the opening 2018 test at?Hockenheim, completed the top three, just 0.024s adrift of Lundgaard’s benchmark.
Toyota Racing Series star?Richard Verschoor was fourth for quickest for?Josef Kaufmann Racing, with fellow series returnee Max Defourny fifth fastest for MP.
Renault junior Victor Martins rounded out the top six, ahead of R-ace GP team-mates Max Fewtrell and Logan Sargeant, who topped the morning session.
Lorenzo Colombo was the top JD Motorsport driver in ninth position, Alex Peroni rounded out the top 10, in front of Red Bull junior?Neil Verhagen.
Arthur Rougier, who beat Martins to the French F4 title last year, was 13th fastest for Fortec Motorsport.
Clement Novalak, who will dovetail Eurocup with BRDC British F3 this season, was 20th on the timesheets. He brought the morning session to a premature end when he stopped out on track.
The test concludes on Wednesday, with the start of the season, also at Paul Ricard, just over two weeks away (April 14).
Day one results
| Pos | Name | Team | Morning | Afternoon |
| 1 | Christian Lundgaard | MP Motorsport | 2:02.231 | 2:01.083 |
| 2 | Oscar Piastri | Arden | 2:02.264 | 2:01.084 |
| 3 | Yifei Ye | Josef Kaufmann Racing | 2:02.404 | 2:01.107 |
| 4 | Richard Verschoor | Josef Kaufmann Racing | 2:02.497 | 2:01.179 |
| 5 | Max Defourny | MP Motorsport | 2:04.344 | 2:01.273 |
| 6 | Victor Martins | R-ace GP | 2:02.764 | 2:01.275 |
| 7 | Max Fewtrell | R-ace GP | 2:02.485 | 2:01.310 |
| 8 | Logan Sargeant | R-ace GP | 2:01.881 | 2:01.335 |
| 9 | Lorenzo Colombo | JD Motorsport | 2:02.723 | 2:01.361 |
| 10 | Alex Peroni | MP Motorsport | 2:02.346 | 2:01.662 |
| 11 | Neil Verhagen | Tech 1 Racing | 2:03.296 | 2:01.715 |
| 12 | Charles Milesi | R-ace GP | 2:02.965 | 2:01.754 |
| 13 | Arthur Rougier | Fortec Motorsports | 2:02.344 | 2:01.783 |
| 14 | Alexander Vartanyan | Arden | 2:03.470 | 2:01.882 |
| 15 | Alexander Smolyar | Tech 1 Racing | 2:02.979 | 2:01.958 |
| 16 | Thomas Maxwell | JD Motorsport | 2:03.961 | 2:02.079 |
| 17 | Thomas Neubauer | Tech 1 Racing | 2:03.911 | 2:02.157 |
| 18 | Eliseo Martinez | AVF | 2:04.416 | 2:02.181 |
| 19 | Xavier Lloveras | AVF | 2:04.416 | 2:02.334 |
| 20 | Clement Novalak | Josef Kaufmann Racing | 2:04.426 | 2:02.377 |
| 21 | Axel Matus | AVF | 2:04.108 | 2:02.468 |
| 22 | Sami Taoufik | Arden | 2:04.809 | 2:02.615 |
| 23 | Jordan Cane | Fortec Motorsports | 2:03.439 | 2:02.739 |
| 24 | Christian Munoz | AVF | 2:04.854 | 2:02.894 |
| 25 | Frank Bird | Tech 1 Racing | 2:04.019 | 2:02.918 |
| 26 | Najiy Razak | JD Motorsport | 2:04.813 | 2:02.933 |
| 27 | Vladimir Tziortzis | Fortec Motorsports | 2:03.604 | 2:03.006 |
| 28 | Raul Guzman | Fortec Motorsports | 2:03.586 | 2:06.267 |