Lynn leads the way in first practice

Alex Lynn made a perfect start to the 2013 Star River‧Windsor Arch Formula 3 Macau Grand Prix weekend, topping the first practice session.

by: Arnau Viñals Vendrell

Making his second appearance on the streets of Macau, the Theodore Racing by Prema driver spent most of 45-minute session in the top 10, before charging to the top of the sheets two minutes before the chequered flag with a 2m14.495s lap.

Last year’s winner António Félix da Costa went very close to knocking Lynn off the top at the end of the session, the Carlin-Volkswagen driver falling just 0.061s short of the benchmark time with his last effort.

Behind Félix da Costa, EuroInternational’s Stefano Coletti was third fastest. The Monegasque, who finished fifth in this year’s GP2 Series, was quickly back up to speed in an F3 car, moving into the top three with eight minutes of the session remaining, and ultimately finishing third with a best of 2m14.603s.

Felix Rosenqvist had an action packed session, the GR Asia with Mücke driver going fastest with seven minutes of the session remaining, before hitting the wall at Matsuya just moments later. The crash ended the Swede’s session early, although he still wound up fourth fastest, just 0.167s off Lynn’s time.

Alexander Sims (ThreeBond with T-Sport) was fifth fastest, while Carlin’s Jazeman Jaafar, who is returning to F3 after spending the season in Formula Renault 3.5, finished sixth, having spent much of the session on top before flurry of quick times in the last 10 minutes.

Carlos Sainz Jnr won the unwelcome award of being the first driver to hit the wall, his Carlin-Volkswagen car damaged when he crashed at Fishermen’s Bend less than 10 minutes into the session.

RESULTS:

POS	NO	DRIVER	NAT	TEAM	TIME	LAPS	GAP	KPH
1	10	Alex LYNN	GBR	Theodore Racing by Prema	2:14.495	18		163.81
2	1	Antonio F. DA COSTA	PRT	Carlin	2:14.556	18	0.061	163.73
3	22	Stefano COLETTI	ITA	EuroInternational	2:14.603	16	0.108	163.68
4	14	Felix ROSENQVIST	SWE	GR Asia with Mucke	2:14.662	8	0.167	163.61
5	23	Alexander SIMS	GBR	Three Bond with T-Sport	2:14.849	13	0.354	163.38
6	4	Jazeman JAAFAR	MYS	Carlin	2:14.864	16	0.369	163.36
7	21	Tom BLOMQVIST	GBR	Fortec Motorsport	2:15.169	17	0.674	162.99
8	8	Raffaele MARCIELLO	ITA	D88.com Prema Powerteam	2:15.181	17	0.686	162.98
9	9	Lucas AUER	AUT	Theodore Racing by Prema	2:15.247	16	0.752	162.90
10	24	Kevin KORJUS	EST	Galaxy Double R Racing	2:15.384	16	0.889	162.73
11	19	Will BULLER	GBR	Fortec Motorsport	2:15.449	15	0.954	162.65
12	18	Pipo DERANI	BRA	Fortec Motorsport	2:15.796	16	1.301	162.24
13	3	Harry TINCKNELL	GBR	Carlin	2:16.410	16	1.915	161.51
14	27	Antonio GIOVINAZZI	ITA	Double R Racing	2:16.540	18	2.045	161.35
15	29	Lucas WOLF	DEU	URD Rennsport	2:16.591	15	2.096	161.29
16	16	Dennis VAN DER LAAR	NLD	KFZ-Teile24 Mucke Motorsport	2:16.627	16	2.132	161.25
17	12	Yuichi NAKAYAMA	JPN	Tom�s	2:16.943	19	2.448	160.88
18	11	Esteban OCON	FRA	Prema Powerteam	2:17.474	15	2.979	160.26
19	6	Nicholas LATIFI	CAN	Carlin	2:17.867	17	3.372	159.80
20	20	John BRYANT-MEISNER	SWE	Fortec Motorsport	2:18.081	18	3.586	159.55
21	2	Carlos SAINZ Jnr	ESP	Carlin	2:18.453	4	3.958	159.13
22	17	Ed JONES	ARE	Fortec Motorsport	2:18.872	17	4.377	158.65
23	28	Katsumasa CHIYO	JPN	B-Max Engineering	2:19.488	15	4.993	157.94
24	30	Nelson MASON	CAN	Jo Zeller Racing	2:19.719	19	5.224	157.68
25	15	Yuhi SEKIGUCHI	JPN	KFZ-Teile24 Mucke Motorsport	2:20.095	6	5.600	157.26
26	26	Sean GELAEL	IDN	Double R Racing	2:20.311	17	5.816	157.02
27	5	Jordan KING	GBR	Carlin	2:21.234	8	6.739	155.99
28	25	SUN Zheng	CHN	Galaxy Double R Racing	2:26.053	8	11.558	150.84