Andreas Estner storms from 28th on grid to finish 11th

Paul RIcard - Circuit du Castellet, Tuesday 25 June 2019 - The second round of the FIA F3 championship took place as part of the French F1 Grand Prix weekend at Paul Ricard in France on June 21-23. Young German driver Andreas Estner was part of it, completing a sensational drive from 28th on the grid to finish 11th.

Andreas Estner during the race in Le Castellet Photo: Paolo Pellegrini

Andreas Estner, Qualifying (P28) “Qualifying was a bit difficult for us. Circuit Paul Ricard is a very fast, very demanding track. It's quite hard on the front tyres. My teammate at Jenzer Motorsport Yuki Tsunoda and I had a big gap to the top runners. At first, the car was not feeling so bad, but somehow it has become extremely difficult to drive and it was impossible to do a good lap time. On the second set of tires we both made a mistake in the first sector, which is why we did not do the same race as the rest of the field. I drove my fast lap while the others were working for a lap with their tires. Then I added a quick lap, but after that the tires were too hot.”

Andreas Estner, Race 1 (P11) "Because of qualifying, I started from far behind in the race and in the first half, the speed was not there. But then I was able to go faster and faster towards the end. It was a lot of fun in the second half of the race, the speed was much better. I enjoyed overtaking and that was a really fun race.”

Race 2, (P11) "In the second race I started from eleventh position but unfortunately I got a bit wide in the first turn during the first lap. I think the tires were not yet at the right temperature, I had definitely not that much grip. My tires were still a bit dirty, which is why I'm not good at them. I came out in the Mistral straight. There was some overtaking thanks to the slipstream but after the first lap I was in position 21 in the race. Once the tires were clean again and I was in the correct window, I could drive faster again. It was similar to the first race, with the difference that the race speed in the first half of the race was even better. So I was able to go back and fight with the front-runners. In the beginning I still had to fight quite a bit and it was hard, but it was then a great race to the end. Ultimately we were missing jus six hundreds to the top 10.”