Spaniard Martí finished third twice during the penultimate round of the F4 Spain Championship in Jerez. Øgaard also completed a strong weekend by scoring valuable points thanks to double top-5 finishes in his Campos Racing-entered Tatuus-Abarth
Campos Racing extended its podium streak in the Formula 4 Spain Championship in Jerez, which hosted the penultimate round of the season this weekend. Pepe Martí and Sebastian Øgaard spearheaded Campos Racing’s charge in southern Spain with both drivers keeping themselves in podium contention throughout the Round 6. Mexican Alex García and Ukrainian Oleksandr Partyshev performed well despite they couldn’t score points this time.
On Saturday morning, both Martí and Øgaard made a strong start to the weekend. They both finished in the top-five in FP1 and then leaded the way in FP2 with the Spaniard posting a fastest lap of 1m43.217s, a mere tenth quicker than his Danish teammate. Later in qualifying, Martí improved his best lap time in the morning to clock a lap of 1m43.061s, which was 3rd-fastest in Q1 and less than a tenth shy of the pole position time set by Dilano van’t Hoff. Øgaard qualified 5th on the starting grid for race 1 with a lap time of 1m43.289s. Further adrift, Partyshev lined up 18th and García 23rd.
When the lights went out on Saturday afternoon, Martí couldn’t make a good getaway and dropped to sixth right behind Øgaard on lap 1. Øgaard and Martí joined Rik Koen and Enric Bordás in which was an exciting battle for rostrum positions with all drivers running in the slipstream train. At the end, Øgaard and Martí moved past Koen and took the checkered flag in fourth and fifth place respectively. Partyshev finished 14th with García crossing the finish line right behind.
On a Sunday fresh morning, Martí secured a front row start in Q2 with a lap time of 1m42.564s and Øgaard qualified in sixth place by clocking a time of 1m42.876s.
In the 18-minute + 1 lap race 2, Martí made a good race start from third on the grid and the Spaniard completed the first lap in the same place with Øgaard running in fifth. The opening laps saw close action from drivers such as Øgaard who was trying to overtake Bordás for fourth. By lap 4, Martí was running in third behind van’t Hoff and Vladislav Ryabov but the safety car was deployed following a race incident. With two minutes to go, the race was briefly green-flagged but another crash brought the red flag and the race came to an end with Martí stepping onto the third place of the rostrum and Øgaard finished fifth. García made a good recovery drive to finish in 15th place, just like Partyshev who had started from the back.
Race 3 took place in tricky wet conditions with a shower forcing Race Director to declare it a wet race. Martí completed the first lap in third place with Øgaard running fifth in the early stages. Martí gained a place when van’t Hoff missed the braking point and ran wide. Still van’t Hoff managed to move past Martí later. With rain getting heavier in the final minutes, Martí brought the car home in third place. Øgaard finally came in seventh place. Partyshev and García took the checkered flag in 14th and 15th places respectively.
With just a round to go in Barcelona, which is scheduled on 13-14 November, Øgaard still sits seconds in the drivers’ standings on 196 points. Martí is third in the standings on 163 points. Finally, Campos Racing sits seconds in the teams’ standings on 332 points.
Photos: FotoCar13
