Linus Lundqvist says he and his Double R team have forgotten about an awful Donington Park weekend with pole position at the British F3 Silverstone Shootout.
While Lundqvist has a Championship lead of 50 points over Nicolai Kjaergaard, a terrible round in the East Midlands saw him qualify 14th and secure finishes of 9th and 15th coupled with a DNF.
“We proved at Rockingham earlier this year that we were quick in the wet and we are happy to prove that again today.
“It was a really exciting session, the car was really good and I am happy with my performance especially going into this weekend with questions about how we would perform after Donington, but we have put that one behind us and came into this one with a clear mind.”
While it would be easy to look to score good points and not worry about winning in the name of safeguarding the Championship, Lundqvist won’t be doing maths in the cockpit.
“I don’t try to focus on where Nicolai is at, I’m at the front and that is all that matters. We want to finish this year on a high with more wins and that will definitely be the target for the first race regardless of whether it is wet or dry.”
Lundqvist shrugged off his wet weather struggles at Donington to take charge of qualifying on Saturday morning.
“It’s always a bit tricky in the wet, especially when it’s a drying track because the speed you can carry differs from lap to lap and you know towards the end you can push more but you don’t want to overheat the tyres too much. I got into a good rhythm, set a quicker lap and then a few cool down laps before pushing again.”
The Swede was happy with the feel of his Double R Tatuus machine and feels that was a contributing factor to a relatively big gap by BRDC British F3 standards.
“Towards the end, it was the second to last lap that I set my best time so the track was constantly drying. It was four tenths between me and the guy in second, it was good to feel comfortable from lap one and be able to push for the rest of the session. We spoke about tyre pressures and getting into the mindset of cooling the tyres if you feel them getting too hot. Everyone did a good job.”
IMAGE: Jakob Ebrey via www.britishf3.com