Colombo gained confidence from Budapest despite losing Race 1 win

27 August 2021

Lorenzo Colombo may have been denied a first Formula 3 win in Budapest as a time penalty dropped him from first to seventh in Race 1, but the Campos driver said that it’s not stopped him carrying over the confidence boost from Round 4.

The young Italian scored his best Qualifying position to date in Hungary, finishing 12th, and went on to convert reverse grid pole to victory but was later served with a 5s time penalty for a Safety Car infringement and stripped of the win.

The result remained his best at this level, and he’s carried that form over into Spa, once again qualifying 12th for reverse grid pole.

“For me, the confidence boost came when we managed to take reverse grid pole and get into the top 12 for the first time in Qualifying,” said Colombo on Budapest. “That was a big confidence boost for everyone. We needed it.

Colombo qualified 12th for the second round in a row, meaning he will start Race 1 from reverse grid pole

“What happened in Hungary needs to be repeated and bettered in the coming events. In Qualifying (today), I repeated my result and tomorrow we will fully send it. When you start from the front, the goal is to maximise your performance and result, and I think I did that pretty well on track in Hungary.

“Spa is very different compared to the Hungaroring, though. There will be many more opportunities to overtake. Of course, I’d love to stay ahead if it is possible, and If I can manage to pull a gap and get out of DRS range, then it will be much easier to manage. But that is very difficult to do here as we’re all doing the same laptimes and the field are all so close to one another.”

Despite the clear improvements, Colombo said that both he and the team still have plenty to learn and pin-pointed one particular area that they will be focusing on ahead of Race 1.

Colombo was denied a first win in Budapest as a time penalty dropped him from first to seventh in Race 1

“We will need to go away and analyse what we have just done in Qualifying because I think that we are still lacking something in the wet,” said Colombo. “This was my first qualifying session in the wet, but I think I managed to adapt quite quickly overall.

“On the dry in Free Practice, I think we had good pace, but we do need to understand the wet a bit better, although in general I feel quite confident in both conditions at the moment.”