Slater sets blistering pace on day one of GB3’s Silverstone test

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Hillspeed’s Freddie Slater continued his strong pre-season GB3 form by dominating Monday’s test at Silverstone.

Slater was quickest in all three sessions in sunny conditions, setting an unofficial lap record of 1m51.753s in the closing stages of the final session to finish 0.553 seconds clear of Xcel Motorsport’s Patrick Heuzenroeder.

Rodin Motorsport’s Gianmarco Pradel set the first representative time of the day 11 minutes into session one following a brief red flag period, and his 1m54.557s lap was swiftly beaten by Hitech GP’s Deagen Fairclough who went 0.04s quicker. Pradel reclaimed top spot on his next lap with a 1m53.843s and then lowered the pace by a further 0.2s.

Slater went 0.5s faster with 10 minutes only to be edged out by Fairclough one minute later, but he then reclaimed the advantage on his next lap with a 1m52.861s and made a series of improvements to remain ahead until the session’s conclusion.

Fairclough set his best lap late on but was 0.7s shy of Slater, with Pradel a second off the pace in third and Xcel Motorsport’s Patrick Heuzenroeder and Rodin Motorsport’s Abbi Pulling close behind. GB4 race winner Finn Harrison, who tested for Chris Dittmann Racing earlier this month, was 1.4s adrift of the outright pace in sixth for Hillspeed.

Heuzenroeder set a new personal best of 1m53.120s to initially lead session two before being displaced by Slater and then Fairclough, who set a new best lap of his own to move ahead with a 1m52.796s just before another red flag. The action resumed with six minutes remaining, enough time for Slater to set two quicker laps to seal top spot again, his best lap of 1m52.571s almost 0.4s shy of his session one time.

Argenti with Prema’s Reza Seewooruthun climbed to third, while Pradel also set a new new personal best but was fifth behind Heuzenroeder.

All but one driver set their quickest times in session three. Fairclough led with a new personal best of 1m52.389s when the session was red-flagged at the 11-minute mark, but he was edged by Pradel a few minutes after drivers returned to track. Heuzenroeder then moved ahead with a 1m52.306s to seal second in the day’s overall classification, with Slater then improving on his own benchmark with three minutes remaining to extend his testing advantage.

Pradel and Fairclough were 0.6s off the outright pace in third and fourth, with Seewooruthun close behind. Ninovic ended the day eighth and the final driver within a second of the pace despite not setting a lap time in the first two sessions.

Italian F4 racer Dion Gowda tested for Xcel and was 10th quickest, British Formula 4 race-winner James Higgins was 21st for Chris Dittmann Racing, while GB3 returnee Hugo Schwarze only completed 14 laps with Velocity Racing Development.

Combined day one results