Aussie Watch: Barter the standout on tough F2® and F3® weekend
Monday, 6 March 2023
The quartet of Aussies in the F1® feeder categories went home pointless after Bahrain, but teenager Hugh Barter showed why he's so highly regarded.
Jack Doohan's FIA Formula 2® championship quest has started with a difficult weekend in Bahrain, with the 20-year-old Australian failing to score points in either the Sprint Race or Feature Race after paying a heavy price for a poor qualifying performance.
Doohan, driving for the Invicta Virtuosi Racing team, was left mired in 17th place after qualifying on Friday, making progress only as far as 11th in Saturday's 23-lap Sprint Race.
He was more competitive in Sunday's 32-lap Feature Race, spending 14 laps inside the top 10 points-paying places, but had to settle for 16th place after crossing the line in 15th, penalised five seconds after the race for a pit lane procedural infringement in an incident involving Indian Jehan Daruvala (MP Motorsport) and Monegasque Arthur Leclerc (DAMS).
Doohan gets an immediate chance to atone for his slow start to the season, with Formula 2® next in action in Jeddah on the undercard for the Formula 1® Saudi Arabian Grand Prix from March 17-19.
In FIA Formula 3®, a trio of Aussies were in action in Bahrain, with debutant Hugh Barter showing plenty of promise on a weekend where neither he, Campos Racing teammate Christian Mansell nor compatriot Tommy Smith (Van Amersfoort Racing) scored points.
Barter, 17, qualified a superb fifth on his maiden outing in the series, but was unlucky in Sunday's 22-lap Feature Race after being clipped by Swede Dino Beganovic at Turn 1 on lap 5, suffering a right rear puncture.
The Japanese-born Melbourne-raised driver limped back to the pits and rejoined in last place, a 26th place finish no reflection of his pace across a weekend where he finished 11th in Saturday's 19-lap Sprint.
Mansell, in his third FIA F3® weekend after outings in Hungary and Belgium last season, qualified 13th and recorded 13th-place results in both the Sprint and Feature Races, while Smith qualified 27th on debut and had a torrid Feature Race, turned around at Turn 8 by Spain's Mari Boya (MP Motorsport) when running in 20th on lap 7, and then spinning off at Turn 1 on the penultimate lap.
F3® is next in action at the FORMULA 1 ROLEX AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX 2023 from March 30-April 2, with the Aussie trio getting to race in front of their home fans at Albert Park for the first time in the category's history.
