The Spaniard finished in ninth place on Sunday after putting in a solid race. Martí, who overtook no less than 17 cars – 27 over the weekend–, and Yeany, who pulled off another remarkable recovery, saw his chances for points dashed due to racing incidents
Campos Racing has completed another strong weekend of the 2022 FIA Formula 3 Championship season with all the drivers showing their speed particularly in race pace. David Vidales, who secured his first win of the season in Barcelona, has made it into the points for the fifth time this season. Pepe Martí and Hunter Yeany were similarly in points hunt but unfortunately two incidents ruined their chances at Silverstone. Their performance is still very encouraging for the events ahead.
On Friday, Campos Racing made a promising star on British soil with Spaniard Martí posting the 10th-fastest lap on the screens of free practice session with a time of 1m45.378s, with his teammate Yeany in 11th and a personal best of 1m45m456s. Vidales’s best effort was a lap of 1m45.471s. On the whole, excellent results considering they were discovering the Silverstone circuit. Later in qualifying, Vidales was in the fight for a top-5 result but sadly he dropped to 13th in the closing seconds of the session losing the opportunity (by a mere 16 thousandths of a second!) to start from the pole position on Saturday. Yeany set to start from 18th and Martí was forced to start from the very back of the grid as a result of his flying laps being cancelled due to track limits.
Saturday’s Sprint race, consisting of 17 laps, saw a breathtaking start and Vidales and Yeany avoiding any clash and Martí, from the back of the grid, soon started to move through the field. On lap 10, Vidales moved past pole-sitter Zak O’Sullivan for 12th and American Yeany had also gained two places. At the end, Vidales took the checkered flag in 12th place and Yeany finished in 16th place. Martí, from 30th on the grid, had moved up to 20th in the classification.
In race 2, more thrilling action was expected and everything came to plan with 22 exciting laps. Vidales, Yeany and Martí had gained several places in the opening stages of the race. Unfortunately, Yeany was sent spinning on lap 9 while running in 13rd place and he rejoined but dropping down the order. Just one lap later, the safety car was deployed when Rafael Villagomez had a massive shunt following contact with Nazim Azman. After five laps, when barrier repairs took place, the safety car came into the pit lane. Vidales, who previously had avoided an incident in front of him involving Roman Stanek and Grégoire Saucy, moved past Kaylen Frederick on the outside to move up to ninth place. From then onwards, Vidales fended off his rivals to defend his position and crossed the finish line in ninth place. Martí had moved up to 13th but an incident on the last lap dropped him to 24th. Yeany ended up in 21st place. Last but not least, Vidales's best lap of 1m46.898s was set on the last lap and similarly the best ones of Martí and Yeany were close to the fastest lap of the race despite of they all started on old rubber.
The fifth round of the FIA F3 season, which also marks the halfway point, will take place at the Red Bull Ring next weekend.
