Silverstone Sunday 24th July 2016
For many years the Formula Renault 3.5 series was the headline category on the Renault World Series package. Thousands of free tickets were given away to meetings at Donington then subsequently Silverstone and the series provided some very good racing and saw some very good drivers pass through the single seater ladder.
Renault however took the decision to withdraw their support for the series last year. With the FIA very keen on establishing a more regimented ladder for the aspiring single seater driver, the series saw itself "demoted" on the Superlicence points list and with a similar car & performance to the GP2 category, Renault were keen to support the 2.0 litre championship instead.
The Spanish based RPM organisation headed by Jaime Alguersuari Sr. took over the running of the category over the winter and it is now called Formula V8 3.5...which doesn't exactly trip off the tongue! With RPM already running the EuroFormula Open and International GT Open championships, a new package has been created and with MSVR organising the weekend's activities the 3 International races were supported by a couple of Radical European Masters encounters on the Sunday.
Kicking off the days proceedings was a 30 minute qualifying session for the F.V8's which saw Mathieu Vaxiviere snatch pole from Saturday's race winner Roy Nissany. Sadly there were only 13 cars present at Silverstone which was 2 cars down on previous races this season. The race itself saw Nissany take the lead at the start and dominated with his Lotus team mate Rene Binder finishing second and Egor Orudzhev third. The main action was behind the leading trio with a good battle for fourth going to Tom Dillmann but only after Aurelien Panis was penalised a position after the race. His use of the tarmac run off on the outside of Stowe to overtake earlier as witnessed by myself was also spotted by the stewards! Poleman Vaxiviere simply had no race pace at all and winded up 7th. The cars are spectacular to watch and especially to listen to with their Zytek 3.4 litre V8 engine at full revs, sadly though it looks like the championship is on its last legs with a grid in the low teens. I don't like to say it but will Formula V8 3.5 go the way of Superleague Formula,Auto GP & A1 GP? The answer is probably yes sadly...
EuroFormulaOpen operates as a championship that fits just below the European F3 series. With the FIA keen not to have 2 pan-European F3 series, the series is strangely forbidden to use F3 in its title! This is despite the fact that all cars are F3 spec Dallara F312 with 2.0 litre Toyota powerplants. Despite the murky world of motorsport politics getting in the way, it was encouraging to see a grid of 18 cars at Silverstone.
16 year old American Colton (son of Brian) Herta took pole position but his race ended following a collision with championship leader Leonardo Pulcini at Abbey. This led to Polish driver Antoni Ptak earning his first victory of the year. Whilst overtaking in F3 has always been hard to accomplish the 15 lapper was an entertaining race to witness at Stowe.
The days best race was the 60 minute International GT Open race. A small but select field of 13 cars took the start but with 8 different marques represented on the grid. This was a case of never mind the width feel the quality! The 2 driver 60 minute format has always provided good racing at GT level as the quandary is whether to start the faster driver and get a lead or put the faster driver in the car second so that time is made up later in the race. The TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage of Euan Hankey/Salih Youluc won comfortably but a very entertaining 2nd place battle was only decided by 0.006 of a second with the BMW M6 of Miguel Ramos/Pieter Schothorst edging out the McLaren 650S of Michael Benham/Duncan Tappy. With 2 Radical RXC's in the field along with a renault RS01 this was certainly an unusual field of GT3 cars and a shame that there were so few present. The mammoth grids of both Blancpain series mean that is there a need for another European GT3 series? Again..probably not.
Providing the first and last races of the day were the 60 minute Radical European Masters. Race 1 saw the obligatory safety car cock-up as it failed to pick up the leader on the road and then never let the cars affected go past to join the rear of the pack. Race 2 saw an enormous amount of penalties handed out for various misdemeanours such as track limits, pitting at the wrong time & not spending enough time in the pits!!
All in all a curious day this was. For an "International" meeting there was a very small crowd present. Indeed there were more present for an Indian wedding that was going on inside The Wing complex than at trackside! The spectators who were there seemed to be those that had wondered in for a look and not quite sure what they were watching. As is usual with Silverstone the only two grandstand's open were those that provided the least amount of view..at Woodcote and opposite the pits.
A curious package too as with Entries of 13,13 + 18 this surely can't be making the promoter RPM any money whatsoever! Silverstone charged £20 on the gate but will hardly have made any money either. It was good to see something a little different to the norm though but one has the feeling that if the package continues in to next year, it won't be visiting the UK...
A few years ago I'd have gone ballistic as there wasn't a programme produced for this meeting. The days of collecting programmes have gone though so just printing off entry lists the night before sufficed on this occasion! The lack of printed programme is also indicative of a promoter/circuit not caring enough about it's product and the few people who cared enough to go and watch it....
Renault however took the decision to withdraw their support for the series last year. With the FIA very keen on establishing a more regimented ladder for the aspiring single seater driver, the series saw itself "demoted" on the Superlicence points list and with a similar car & performance to the GP2 category, Renault were keen to support the 2.0 litre championship instead.
The Spanish based RPM organisation headed by Jaime Alguersuari Sr. took over the running of the category over the winter and it is now called Formula V8 3.5...which doesn't exactly trip off the tongue! With RPM already running the EuroFormula Open and International GT Open championships, a new package has been created and with MSVR organising the weekend's activities the 3 International races were supported by a couple of Radical European Masters encounters on the Sunday.
Kicking off the days proceedings was a 30 minute qualifying session for the F.V8's which saw Mathieu Vaxiviere snatch pole from Saturday's race winner Roy Nissany. Sadly there were only 13 cars present at Silverstone which was 2 cars down on previous races this season. The race itself saw Nissany take the lead at the start and dominated with his Lotus team mate Rene Binder finishing second and Egor Orudzhev third. The main action was behind the leading trio with a good battle for fourth going to Tom Dillmann but only after Aurelien Panis was penalised a position after the race. His use of the tarmac run off on the outside of Stowe to overtake earlier as witnessed by myself was also spotted by the stewards! Poleman Vaxiviere simply had no race pace at all and winded up 7th. The cars are spectacular to watch and especially to listen to with their Zytek 3.4 litre V8 engine at full revs, sadly though it looks like the championship is on its last legs with a grid in the low teens. I don't like to say it but will Formula V8 3.5 go the way of Superleague Formula,Auto GP & A1 GP? The answer is probably yes sadly...
EuroFormulaOpen operates as a championship that fits just below the European F3 series. With the FIA keen not to have 2 pan-European F3 series, the series is strangely forbidden to use F3 in its title! This is despite the fact that all cars are F3 spec Dallara F312 with 2.0 litre Toyota powerplants. Despite the murky world of motorsport politics getting in the way, it was encouraging to see a grid of 18 cars at Silverstone.
16 year old American Colton (son of Brian) Herta took pole position but his race ended following a collision with championship leader Leonardo Pulcini at Abbey. This led to Polish driver Antoni Ptak earning his first victory of the year. Whilst overtaking in F3 has always been hard to accomplish the 15 lapper was an entertaining race to witness at Stowe.
The days best race was the 60 minute International GT Open race. A small but select field of 13 cars took the start but with 8 different marques represented on the grid. This was a case of never mind the width feel the quality! The 2 driver 60 minute format has always provided good racing at GT level as the quandary is whether to start the faster driver and get a lead or put the faster driver in the car second so that time is made up later in the race. The TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage of Euan Hankey/Salih Youluc won comfortably but a very entertaining 2nd place battle was only decided by 0.006 of a second with the BMW M6 of Miguel Ramos/Pieter Schothorst edging out the McLaren 650S of Michael Benham/Duncan Tappy. With 2 Radical RXC's in the field along with a renault RS01 this was certainly an unusual field of GT3 cars and a shame that there were so few present. The mammoth grids of both Blancpain series mean that is there a need for another European GT3 series? Again..probably not.
Providing the first and last races of the day were the 60 minute Radical European Masters. Race 1 saw the obligatory safety car cock-up as it failed to pick up the leader on the road and then never let the cars affected go past to join the rear of the pack. Race 2 saw an enormous amount of penalties handed out for various misdemeanours such as track limits, pitting at the wrong time & not spending enough time in the pits!!
All in all a curious day this was. For an "International" meeting there was a very small crowd present. Indeed there were more present for an Indian wedding that was going on inside The Wing complex than at trackside! The spectators who were there seemed to be those that had wondered in for a look and not quite sure what they were watching. As is usual with Silverstone the only two grandstand's open were those that provided the least amount of view..at Woodcote and opposite the pits.
A curious package too as with Entries of 13,13 + 18 this surely can't be making the promoter RPM any money whatsoever! Silverstone charged £20 on the gate but will hardly have made any money either. It was good to see something a little different to the norm though but one has the feeling that if the package continues in to next year, it won't be visiting the UK...
A few years ago I'd have gone ballistic as there wasn't a programme produced for this meeting. The days of collecting programmes have gone though so just printing off entry lists the night before sufficed on this occasion! The lack of printed programme is also indicative of a promoter/circuit not caring enough about it's product and the few people who cared enough to go and watch it....
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| The only proof I was there!! |
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