Photo: ACI Sport
Freddie Slater was victorious in both Formula Regional European Championship races at Paul Ricard last weekend.
He was 0.094 seconds behind R-ace GP’s Enzo Deligny in free practice one, then lowered the pace to 1m57.782s in FP2 to have a 0.361s gap to Trident’s Matteo De Palo at the top. Prema team-mate Rashid Al Dhaheri and ART Grand Prix’s Evan Giltaire were 0.522s behind in third and fourth.
Qualifying for race one was split into two groups, and De Palo went quickest in the first. He set a 1m59.332s, heading CL Motorsport’s Michael Belov by 0.244s and ART GP’s Taito Kato by 0.3s.
CL’s Zachary David had his fastest lap deleted for causing red flags and ended up without a representative time, while Giltaire was 0.369s off the top in fourth.
Laptimes were considerably quicker in the disruption-free second group, and Slater earned pole with a 1m57.351s. He was 0.272s faster than R-ace’s Akshay Bohra, and had 0.529s in hand over Van Amersfoort Racing’s Pedro Clerot in third. All but two drivers beat De Palo, and Bedrin was fifth fastest but did not start from ninth due to stalling on the formation lap.
Slater dominated race one, winning by 7.917s to take the points lead. Belov got into third at the start ahead of Kato, Bohra, Clerot and VAR’s Hiyu Yamakoshi. Kato pulled off an impressive move around the outside of Belov on lap two, and by lap four Belov had fallen behind Bohra and Clerot too. Giltaire dived past early on lap five, with Deligny and R-ace’s Jin Nakamura following through a few corners later.
Prema’s Jack Beeton took several laps of pressuring before he cleared Belov, with the positions mostly settled ahead. Clerot got on Bohra’s tail at the end, and seventh was decided on lap 13 when Deligny overtook Giltaire off-track at turn two and Nakamura also got past the latter before Deligny could return the place.
Bedrin made his way into the squabble for 13th place at the finish after starting from the pitlane.
Slater had pole again for race two the next day ahead of Al Dhaheri, who missed race one. It was initially Al Dhaheri who had to get defensive, as Bohra got into third at turn two on the opening lap. Clerot dropped from third to sixth but gained back a spot as Deligny spun.
Bohra continued to challenge Al Dhaheri until the safety car appeared on lap three due to Prema’s Doriane Pin and Race Performance Motorsport’s Giovanni Maschio crashing at turn one. Red flags then waved, with the race restarting behind the safety car on lap six.
Green flags waved again on lap eight and Slater kept Al Dhaheri at bay. De Palo overtook Bohra on lap nine but went off, with Clerot then getting through. Giltaire also made a move despite almost spinning, and once ex-points leader De Palo had got back ahead of him the drivers ahead had already broken clear. Later on, Giltaire fended off Nakamura for sixth.
Results round-up
Race 1 (17 laps)
1 Freddie Slater Prema 33m41.620s
2 Matteo De Palo Trident +7.917s
3 Taito Kato ART Grand Prix +9.303s
4 Akshay Bohra R-ace GP +12.102s
5 Pedro Clerot Van Amersfoort Racing +12.271s
6 Hiyu Yamakoshi Van Amersfoort Racing +16.671s
7 Enzo Deligny R-ace GP +22.014s
8 Jin Nakamura R-ace GP +22.657s
9 Evan Giltaire ART Grand Prix +25.084s
10 Jack Beeton Prema +25.697s
Pole: Slater, 1m57.351s
Fastest lap: Slater, 1m58.223s
Race 2 (15 laps)
1 Slater 41m07.194s
2 Rashid Al Dhaheri Prema +0.504s
3 Bohra +1.261s
4 Clerot +1.772s
5 De Palo +6.522s
6 Giltaire +7.459s
7 Nakamura +7.959s
8 Nikita Bedrin Sainteloc Racing +9.107s
9 Nandhavud Bhirombhakdi Trident +9.926s
10 Deligny +12.086s
FL: Al Dhaheri, 1m58.862s
Championship standings
1 Slater 168 2 De Palo 148 3 Clerot 106 4 Deligny 97 5 Giltaire 91 6 Yamakoshi 78 7 Al Dhaheri 75 8 Bohra 68 9 Kato 47 10 Nakamura 31