Maini's Guest Column: Vital momentum for MP Motorsport

If you ranked the teams on satisfaction with its efforts in Budapest, MP Motorsport is surely top of that list. Kush Maini secured his first podium in Formula 3 after coming close earlier in the season, but finally stood on the rostrum ahead of the summer break.

We asked the Indian driver to reflect on his weekend at the Hungaroring and reveal how things unfolded from within the team as well as what he’s expecting when we resume racing at Spa-Francorchamps later this month.

ONE GOOD POINT – FIRST PODIUM

I think one good point from the weekend would be getting the first podium. I think it's been a long time coming and putting in a lot of effort. Our pace has been really good all year but it just kept slipping away. But I think this weekend we finally grabbed it. That's the momentum we all needed.

ONE BAD POINT – FEATURE RACE

It was frustrating. We were P5 all race. We had good pace, right behind P2, P3 and P4. We fought really hard that race and we were P5 the whole race and on the last lap two drivers on slick tyres passed us on the last lap, and one was in the last corner so we had to settle for seventh which was a bit frustrating so I would say that was the only really bad or frustrating point from the weekend.

ONE THING I LEARNED – TYRE WARM-UP

In this Championship, you learn something different every weekend. So I would say this weekend would probably be how different the warm-up was to the previous one. I think it showed me that every different track how you have to bring the tyres in differently, how long they last, how slow your cool down needs to be. It taught me and in this season in general how important the tyres being in the window is as it's a very small window in this Championship to get it right. But when you do, everything comes together.

FANS MIGHT HAVE MISSED – MISTAKEN IDENTITY

As a team, my teammates and I get along really well, we have a lot of fun. Most weekends we have a good time together and with the team as well. So this weekend the thing that comes to mind is my teammate Caio getting his mechanic’s nationality wrong in the press conference after the Sprint Race. I'm pretty sure he's gonna be angry that I said that, but you guys asked for it.

NEXT UP – SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS

I think Spa is a lovely track, one of the most historic circuits we have. It’s so iconic, Eau Rouge and certainly long straights. I think the race is going to be a lot different than what we saw in Hungary. There’s going to be a lot of overtaking. Qualifying isn't going to be the most important session whereas in Hungary it was. So I think it's going to be a round you really don't want to miss. Anything can happen. I've always personally liked Spa and gone well around there in the past so I'm super psyched for it. Just a short summer break and then we're back on.