Trummer tops dramatic practice session

The final round of the GP3 Series continued this afternoon with the second practice session at Autodromo Nazionale Monza. Simon Trummer eventually claimed the top spot with a time of 1:45.103 set on his very last lap. The Swiss driver beat out Tom Dillmann who had been top for the majority of the incident filled session. Lotus ART’s championship contenders Valtteri Bottas and James Calado watched the session from the pits choosing to save their tires for qualifying tomorrow.

The field hit the track in scorching hot conditions, and it was MW Arden who was quickest straight out of the pits with Williamson setting the fastest time ahead of his teammate Trummer until Dillmann set a time to beat, going nearly one second quicker than the leading pair.

Title contender Alexander Sims had a session to forget when just ten minutes in he went off track at the Parabolica, hitting the tire wall – the Brit rejoined the session but was unable to better eleventh spot. Sims wasn’t the only driver to find trouble: Adrian Quaife-Hobbs, Lewis Williamson and Daniel Mancinelli were getting a bit too racy on track, and the result was a clash between the two Brits, also at the Parabolica, with Mancinelli also running off at the same corner.

As the session came to an end Dillmann was holding firm at the top of the time sheet for Addax Team, but with just one minute remaining on the clock Trummer snatched the honors from the Frenchman after slipstreaming teammate Mitch Evans, who had to settle for second. Quaife-Hobbs clung onto third despite his incident, while Evans, Gabby Chaves, Richie Stanaway, Conor Daly, Tamas Pal Kiss, Nigel Melker and Williamson rounded out the top ten.

Next up for GP3 is qualifying tomorrow at 08:45 local time.

Practice 2 times: