Stanek fastest in F3 Free Practice, ahead of Peroni

FIA Formula 3’s youngest driver, Roman Stanek, topped his first ever session in the Championship by going fastest in Free Practice at Barcelona ahead of Campos’ Alex Peroni, and PREMA’s Logan Sargeant. The Charouz Racing System driver set his time of 1:33.737 just before a red flag ended the session after Alessio Deledda went off track.

Most of the grid opted not to get out onto the Circuit De Barcelona-Catalunya straight away, with only Campos and Charouz’s drivers getting a flying lap on the board in the opening five minutes. It was a fairly steady one at that, with Stanek the first racer to top the leader board, testing the track conditions and warming up his tires with a 1m 37s.

Leonardo Pulcini headed out for the first time in 2020 with Carlin Buzz Racing, and instantly leapt to first place by dropping the time down to 1:35.175. His teammate, Clément Novalak, went one better on his maiden flying lap, dropping the time by two tenths of a second.

The rest of the field began to head out for their first runs of the weekend, with Théo Pourchaire, Jake Hughes and Sargeant all exchanging the fastest time between them. All three momentarily held on to it, but Sargeant appeared to be the most in control.

The new Championship leader was then joined at the top by his title rival and teammate Oscar Piastri, who dived into second place ahead of Hughes. They were then separated by Peroni as the cars headed back into the pits for a freshen up. When they returned, the Campos racer went one better, going the quickest by just 0.004s.

Stanek managed to dash into first place, before Deledda skidded off the circuit and came to a halt in the gravel trap, which brought out a red flag. With just three minutes to go, the session was ended prematurely.

That meant that Stanek held on to first place, one tenth of a second ahead of Peroni and Sargeant. Igor Fraga sat fourth, with Piastri fifth, followed by Hughes, Pourchaire, David Beckmann, Liam Lawson, and Frederik Vesti.

Having topped a session for the first time in F3, Stanek will look to take the confidence gained into Qualifying at 2pm local time.

Practice Results

POS	No.	Driver	Team	LAPS	GAP	INT.
1	23	R. Stanek	Charouz Racing System	15	0.000	0.000
2	29	A. Peroni	Campos Racing	13	0.186	0.186
3	3	L. Sargeant	PREMA Racing	14	0.190	0.004
4	24	I. Fraga	Charouz Racing System	16	0.266	0.076
5	1	O. Piastri	PREMA Racing	13	0.453	0.187
6	15	J. Hughes	HWA RACELAB	11	0.498	0.045
7	7	T. Pourchaire	ART Grand Prix	12	0.514	0.016
8	11	D. Beckmann	Trident	10	0.589	0.075
9	5	L. Lawson	Hitech Grand Prix	14	0.600	0.011
10	2	F. Vesti	PREMA Racing	14	0.711	0.111
11	6	D. Hauger	Hitech Grand Prix	18	0.714	0.003
12	26	C. Novalak	Carlin Racing	10	0.736	0.022
13	16	J. Doohan	HWA RACELAB	11	0.779	0.043
14	10	L. Zendeli	Trident	9	0.809	0.030
15	9	S. Fernández	ART Grand Prix	12	0.865	0.056
16	22	M. Nannini	Jenzer Motorsport	13	0.892	0.027
17	4	M. Fewtrell	Hitech Grand Prix	14	0.895	0.003
18	20	C. Williams	Jenzer Motorsport	13	0.984	0.089
19	21	F. Malvestiti	Jenzer Motorsport	13	1.005	0.021
20	19	L. Dunner	MP Motorsport	12	1.045	0.040
21	17	R. Verschoor	MP Motorsport	10	1.089	0.044
22	12	O. Caldwell	Trident	12	1.136	0.047
23	14	E. Fittipaldi	HWA RACELAB	11	1.403	0.267
24	8	A. Smolyar	ART Grand Prix	12	1.422	0.019
25	27	L. Pulcini	Carlin Racing	12	1.439	0.017
26	18	B. Viscaal	MP Motorsport	11	1.598	0.159
27	28	C. Das	Carlin Buzz Racing	12	1.679	0.081
28	30	A. Deledda	Campos Racing	13	1.793	0.114
29	31	S. Floersch	Campos Racing	14	2.068	0.275
30	25	D. Schumacher	Charouz Racing System	9	2.494	0.426