Crawford's Guest Column: Lessons learned after up and down 2022 season

Jak Crawford was one of seven drivers in the title hunt heading into the final round of the 2022 FIA Formula 3 season.

While things did not go the way of the American PREMA Racing driver, Crawford says that his '22 season was incredibly valuable, explaining why in our first post-season guest column.

ONE GOOD POINT - VICTORY IN SPIELBERG

One good thing from the season was my win at the Red Bull Ring. I think that even though it was the Sprint Race, it was one of the most complete races I’d done. No big mistakes and I executed everything well, overtakes and tyre deg and staying ahead when I didn’t have DRS. The Red Bull Ring Sprint Race was probably the highest point of the season. We were quite high up in the Championship at that point.

ONE BAD POINT - SPA QUALIFYING

The worst point of the season was in Qualifying for Spa-Francorchamps when I was P30. All of the people ahead of me in the Championship had issues in Qualifying and I think that was my chance to make up the deficit in the Championship but after I spun, I lost that chance. Getting back up there made life a lot more difficult for the last two rounds to gain the points back for the Championship. Spa Qualifying was where I needed to make a step up and it was in fact my worst moment of the year.

READ MORE: Karting prepared me for ‘completely different’ style of driving in F3 says Mini

WHAT I LEARNED - TITLE CHALLENGES

I learned quite a lot this year, more than any other season. Fighting at the front and fighting for a Championship, I think you learn a lot more. I learned a lot about myself and the key to this year was not thinking about the title. At times I thought about the Championship I made big mistakes and when I wasn’t thinking about it, I was on the pace and really going for it. That was the biggest thing, not to think about the Championship.

FANS MAY HAVE MISSED - TEAM BONDING

There were lots of funny moments within the team. There were a lot of inside jokes between the drivers and the engineers. I think it’s probably best if those are kept between us!

UP NEXT - WINTER BREAK

Going into the winter break, it’s sad that the season ended a little bit early so we have a long winter gap now. But, in the end, I’m looking forward to getting back in a car and going to do a lot of training and a bit of go-karting during the winter. Really looking forward to spending some time at home in America and then some time in the UK preparing for next season.