Beganovic targeting win to kickstart 2024 campaign after strong Melbourne Sprint

23 March 2024

Dino Beganovic climbed from P10 to P6 in the Melbourne Sprint Race, a result he was more than satisfied with having lost out on points in Sakhir in Round 1.

The PREMA Racing driver made bold moves throughout, fighting right to the chequered flag and taking sixth from teammate Gabriele Minì at the final corner of the last lap.

After jumping out of the car, the Swede said that it had been a tough but positive drive through the pack after suffering a poor initial getaway at lights out. He also highlighted how tough the race had been, with tyre degradation being much higher than the team expected prior to the Sprint.

“It was a very hectic race, a lot of things happening all the time. I didn’t have a great first lap, the start wasn’t good, and I lost some positions, so that wasn’t great.

“The deg was higher than we expected, so we were fast in the beginning but then dropped in the middle part of the race. Luckily, we had a Safety Car so I could recover the tyres and then in the last part I could push again and make up some positions. It was a busy race though with a lot going on, but I’m happy with P6 in the end.

“It’s hard because you want to move forward but at the same time, you have to save the tyres, so you need to compromise a bit. It was more than we expected and it’s something we’ve learned for tomorrow, so we’ll try to do a better job on that to have solid points tomorrow.”

Beganovic says that he learned a lot about the tyres and is feeling confident after the Sprint Race

After the disappointment of Bahrain, Beganovic is essentially starting on the back foot this weekend with two points to his name. The Scuderia Ferrari Academy talent says that the familiarity he has built up with his PREMA team has made that prospect much less daunting.

Familiarity, trust and experience with the mechanics and engineers from his previous seasons of racing in PREMA red have him feeling confident of what the rest of the season holds.

“I feel very good with the team and with my car, the guys I’m working with too. It’s the fifth year I’m working with the team, so I have experience with them. It feels good to be in that kind of environment with them, it’s important to me and I think any athlete.

“I’m happy with it and I think it definitely makes us stronger even though maybe sometimes we aren’t the fastest on the track, we can make a step and it shows we have performance.”

That fightback will start from P3 on the grid for the Feature Race, and he has his eyes set on taking a maiden victory in the Championship that has so far eluded him.

Taking the lessons learned from today’s Sprint, Beganovic says there will be plenty of data that is looked over before the team formulate a plan of attack for tomorrow’s race.

“The ultimate goal is to win. But we learned a lot today on the tyres and how to manage them. There’s a lot to look at, we have some time before tomorrow so we’ll be looking into that and seeing what we can do better for tomorrow and look to score big points.”