Cohen happy with 'redemption' points after tough start to Silverstone Sprint Race

8 July 2023

Ido Cohen secured his first Formula 3 points of the season in a very tough Sprint Race around Silverstone. The race went from dry conditions to fully wet, before drying out once again before the end. The Rodin Carlin driver made the most of his opportunity, as others made strategic or driving errors that cost them places by the chequered flag.

Speaking afterwards, Cohen said that it was a huge team effort and that he was very happy to have done all he could along with his team to maximise their result.

“I think it was a great effort for me and from the team. We called the strategy right which made a huge difference at the end. It was really important to be on the right tyres at the end and that's what made it all work out.

“I would say the first half of it was quite straight forward. The second half of it was really tricky, especially on the first few laps after the Safety Car with me still on slicks and I had 20 cars behind me on wets, which was much faster at the time.

“I just tried not to have any contact with anyone, to keep it on track with slicks in wet conditions which was really difficult, so it was a really tricky race.”

Before the rain had even arrived, Cohen’s race was going to be difficult. Going from P26 on the grid, the Rodin Carlin driver was expecting to be embroiled in plenty of wheel-to-wheel battles. But, when conditions began to deteriorate, he was set to endure a demoralising result in the end.

But with the right strategy and by persevering all the way to the chequered flag, Cohen mounted a stellar comeback drive through the pack as he maximised his strategy. There were more than a few occasions though when he and the team thought about switching him to wets.

“I started P26 and went forward 17 positions. It was actually really interesting because everyone pitted and I stayed out so after that, I was P14. After the first lap following the Safety Car, everyone overtook me because it was fully wet conditions, and I was still on the slick tyres. So I was pretty much all the way back down the order. But then I was able to overtake everyone at the end as the dry tyres started working to get me to P9. It was quite exciting.

“I think at the start, I was always going to start on the slick tyres. I think it was a really close decision when the Safety Car came out. We had to basically take a gamble and decide if we came into the pits and switch tyres or not. During that lap approaching the pitlane, we changed our minds a couple of times, so it was it was a close decision. But in the end, we got it right and that's what was important.

“I was quite worried that we made the wrong decision. But we were lucky with the long Safety Car, and it really helped us to dry up the track where no one could gain an advantage over us. When we restarted, most of the track wasn’t too bad apart from sector two, which was still fully wet. But it dried up really quick and towards the last few laps, the track was very close to being completely dry.”

Once again, during a race in which changeable conditions played a big role, Rodin Carlin was able to select the right strategy to fire its driver to a good result. Like Zak O’Sullivan in 2022 in Budapest, Cohen says that the team’s intuition and experience played a pivotal role in the result.

“I feel like it has to do both with the car and the personnel in the team. I feel like they can get the important decisions done really well, In this case, weather conditions. Maybe it has to do with the fact that they have this kind of weather all the time being from the UK. But at the end of the day, we made the right call, which was cool and it really paid off.

“From my side, I'm really happy with the second half of the race but the first half didn’t really go as well as I wanted. We were lucky enough to have those crazy conditions towards the end, so I got some redemption and it really paid off.”