PARTH GHORPADE RACE REPORT

 RD 4 OF F3 OPEN AT RED BULL RING ,AUSTRIA

 3RD - 5TH JULY

 Parth Ghorpade made an impressive return to International motorsport at Rd 4 of the F3 Open held at Red Bull Ring in Austria on the 4th/5th July. Driving for DAV RACING in what was his first race after December 2013, Parth surprised the team and the paddock by matching the front runners in race pace and race craft inspite of the long absence from competition. He finished Race 1 in the points at P10 and Race 2 in P12 , but what was noteworthy was the error free racing, consistency , and closing the gap in race pace to within half second of the leaders by the end of the weekend. It is not easy when you consider there had been only 4 days of testing this year whereas the rest of the grid had been testing since January and this was the 5th race meeting.

 The weekend had got off to a torrid start as the Thu and Fri tests had him down almost 2 sec to the front runners. This was unexpected as he had been trading fastest laps with some, including his team mate, at Misano the week before. These problems continued into the first qualifying , where he qualified at the tail end again almost 2 sec off the pace. The team acceded to his request to change his engine which he felt was down on power. Sure enough, in Race 1 he was in the points and within half second of the leaders. After such a long absence, it was a good comeback from a difficult situation. Qualifying for Race 2 was going well ( P7 till the last moments ) but a radio problem made him miss a call for a cool down lap till it was too late and allowed others to slip ahead. Had he qualified a few places up a fight for the top 6 was on the cards.

 Parth had to withdraw form racing last year after sustaining a serious shoulder injury due to a wrong seat fitting while testing a F3 car at Pembrey in June. Testing in December had indicated the recovery was not complete, and hence it was decided to postpone the return till the recovery was complete. He will be driving in the remaining 3 rds at Spa, Monza and Barcelona. DAV Racing is a professional team, and he has the advantage of a seriously quick team mate in Leo Pulcini, who also won Race 1 last weekend.