Preview – F3 Round 9 – Spa-Francorchamps 

The Formula 3 Championship has packed up in Hungary and pitched up in Belgium for Round 9 of the series at the historic Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

It’s hard to be believe that the penultimate round of the championship is already upon us, albeit with the title still very much undecided. With two Sprints and two Feature Race opportunities remaining, there’s still everything to play for after Luke Browning, who leapfrogged Lindblad to regain second in the Drivers’ standings last time out at the Hungaroring. Current leader Mini finished outside the points in both races and Luke’s eighth place in the Sprint puts him within four points of a title challenge. Each race performance can really swing the pendulum now, in favour of a strong advantage or a bitter blow. As important is pole position, for which the two points awarded before the lights even go out could make all the difference.

It promises to be a grandstand fight to the finish of a spectacular season that has produced 10 different race winners and looks likely to keep the fans on the edge of their seats all the way until the finale on 1 September.

After a string of positive performances from the whole Hitech trio, Martinius Stenshorne will be eager to round out his season with more good results to add to his win, podium and points tally, while Cian Shields is very much knocking on the door of the points-paying positions. The team meanwhile will do its utmost to close the gap to the top three.

Fast and challenging, Spa-Francorchamps is a firm favourite for most of the drivers. 7.004km in length, it has more than 100m of elevation change so it really couldn’t be more different to the relatively slow nature of the turns at the Hungaroring and is all about the medium and high-speed stuff. Many of the corners have been resurfaced since last year’s event, and consequently this should contribute to an increase in overall grip.

While Budapest was typically hot, the weather in the Ardennes region can be a little more temperamental. Past races have witnessed both scorching temperatures and torrential downpours – often during the same weekend!

Friday 26 July

09:55 Free Practice

15:05 Qualifying session

Saturday 27 July

09:50 Sprint Race (12 Laps)

Sunday 28 July

08:30 Feature Race (15 Laps)

Grid set by reversing Top 12 of Qualifying Results

All times local