Rookie Trophy for Jehan in Assen

Assen, Netherlands: Sahara Force India Academy racer, Jehan Daruvala continued his learning curve in his first year of Formula Cars at the Assen Circuit. The 4.5 km long circuit in North Netherlands was host to Round 5 of the Formula Renault 2.0 NEC series. A tough qualifying followed by good pace in the races, saw Jehan win another Best Rookie trophy.

 In the two practice sessions Jehan was eighth and fourth on the list of 24 drivers. Qualifying 1 was stopped twice due to incidents and in the final few minutes Jehan could not post a good laptime, putting him seventh on the list. Matters got worse for the 16 year old racer, after his fastest laptime was deleted for crossing track limits and he fell to eighteenth on the grid.

 In the second qualifying, Jehan encountered a slower driver on his fast lap and could manage only ninth on the list. Again, his quickest time was removed and he fell to tenth for race 2.

 Jehan started eighteenth in race 1 and held his position at the start. After lap 1, he slowly managed to work his way up the order and eventually finished in eleventh. The race was won by Belgian racer Dries Vanthoor ahead of the Japanese, Ukyo Sasahara.

 The packed to capacity Assen circuit had just over 100,000 spectators on Sunday as Jehan raced for the first time in front of such a huge audience. He started Race 2 from tenth, but fell to eleventh after a poor start. In the hair-pin bend after corner 2, Jehan made a brave move around the outside and used the dirty part of the track. His move paid off, as he overtook 3 cars in one go. The downside was that his tyres got dirty and he lost a bit of grip, which saw him lose a position and fall to ninth. Jehan made another position after a driver in front was forced to take a penalty and then with 4 laps left, Max Defourney spun right in front of him. Jehan was forced to leave the track to avoid a collision.

 Jehan eventually finished seventh and his quick pace meant that he also bagged his first ever fastest lap in Formula Cars. Louis Deletraz won ahead of Callan O’Keefe and Sasahara. Jehan was the best of the Rookies and therefore won another trophy on the podium.

 Jehan’s efforts saw him move to second position in the Rookie table just 4.5 points away from Max Defourney, the 2014 Italian F4 Champion.

 “Qualifying was not great. I got my best time taken away as I did cross the track limits. But I had a good start and in turn four could overtake three cars. In the race I tried to get into a good race rhythm and I was happy with my race pace.” said the young Sahara Force India Academy member.