Saucy fastest for third time in FIA F3 pre-season testing

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Gregoire Saucy made it three sessions out of three as he topped the times again on the second morning of FIA Formula 3 pre-season testing at Bahrain.

The ART Grand Prix driver sat atop the timesheet for the majority of the session. PHM Racing by Charouz’s Sophia Floersch was fastest early on, but when drivers were not yet lapping at a representative pace, then Rodin Carlin’s Hunter Yeany set a 1m50.500s that was the first proper flying lap of the day.

Jenzer Motorsport’s Taylor Barnard dropped the pace by over 2.3 seconds by becoming the first to lap in the 1m48s, but was only on top for a minute before Saucy set a 1m48.083s.

Trident’s Gabriel Bortoleto then broke into the 1m47s a few moments later, and stayed on top for 20 minutes before a flurry of improvements came in. Hitech GP’s Sebastian Montoya set a 1m47.480s, fellow Hitech driver Luke Browning then went 0.141s faster, then Saucy became the first driver in the 1m46s.

It put him 0.424s clear of Prema’s Dino Beganovic, with Bortoleto, Browning and Barnard filling the next positions, and Saucy later improved by 0.055s before a 10-minute red flag stoppage at the end of hour one of the two-and-a-half hour session.

Following that, there was a lot of track activity but barely any improvements in laptime.

Hitech’s Gabriele Mini went third fastest as the session reached its halfway point, and Browning was shuffled down to seventh by MP Motorsport’s Franco Colapinto and ART Grand Prix’s Nikola Tsolov.

That order went unchanged through the next hour, with more drivers concentrating on long runs. The only improvement in laptime came from Jenzer’s Alex Garcia down in 27th place shortly before the chequered flag was waved.

Morning session results