Guanyu Zhou won the first race of 2018 of the European F3 after stealing first place from the Poleman Dan Ticktum at the start. The British rookie finished third after also being overtaken by Ralf Aron.
Dan Ticktum got the Pole at the first race of the weekend in Pau that opened the 2018 season of the Formula 3 championship. However, the joy for the MotoPark rookie did not last long, as he was overtaken by Dan Ticktum at the very beginning. Ralf Aron kept third place.
After 10 minutes, Devlin DeFrancesco’s crash caused a Full Course Yellow that stopped the race. At the restart, Ticktum tried, without success, to take the leadership. The calm did not last, since a problem with Ben Hingeley’s car forced the British to retire from the race, and it forced the safety car to go out because the Hitech had to be removed from the track.
With only 20 minutes left to finish the race, the safety car went in. Zhou kept P1 smoothly and Aron won the second position against Ticktum. Mick Schumacher had a little incident at the restart that left him in 19th place.
After several calm minutes without incidents, except for the Indian drivers Jehan Daruvala and Amedya Vaidyanathan, with only 10 minutes for the end of the race,the safety car went back on track due to Keyvan Andres Soori’s crash.
The race was restarted with barely any time for more action. Zhou crossed the finish line in first place, getting his first victory in the category. Aron, in his Prema return, obtained a second position which meant it was a one-two for the Italian team. Ticktum finished in third place. Sacha Fenestraz, Marcus Armstrong, Enaam Ahmed, Álex Palou, Robert Shwartzmann, Marino Sato and Juri Vips got points and completed the Top10. Ticktum, Fenestraz and Armstrong were on the rookies podium.
Next race will be tomorrow morning at 11:10am local time. The third and last race will start at 15:25pm.