As we expected, we learned a lot for the rest of the season, in the first four days at Castellet for the first stage of the FIA F3 European Championship 2016.
On thurday, for the collective tests, the track stayed dry despite the overcast weather. In these conditions Anthoine came in second in the morning and in eighth the afternoon.
On friday both the weather and the timings were a bit chaotic. With two practice sessions in the morning on a wet and evolving track made things difficult. For the first timed practice session, the drying track didn't help things and Anthoine could only manage 13th place. For the second session, Anthoine was locked between two other cars Anthoine came 10th for races 2 and 3.
On Saturday morning for the first race, Anthoine stalled and was left on the starting line. He then had to come back from last place and make up as much time as possible. Anthoine finished 17th. In the afternoon for race 2, Anthoine was in 5th position after a good start and dodging turbulences in a turning. Two safety cars later and after having kept the 5th posisiton for the whole race, Anthoine is forced to go off road to avoid another car, which makes him lose 3 places.
On Sunday morning, under a menacing sky, it was the start of the 3rd and final race. After the first lap Anthoine is in 9th place, but the race leaders have a good lead. With 4 to 5 tenths of a second per lap, Anthoine's pace was high, and he overtook LORANDI (Italy), and ARON (Estonia) and his british teammate NEWEY, and finished in 6th with only 2 tenths of a second from STROLL (Canada).
In Anthoine's words : "I'm not satisfied with the results, but there was good teamwork during these 4 days, and there a lots of positive things to learn from this first event. Things are getting into place and the car has enormous potential. I sadly missed the qualifying and make some mistakes that I won't make again.
The next event is in three weeks in Hungary.
