Hitech GP’s championship leader Kush Maini claimed his second win of the year in the British F3 Championship in race three at Donington Park, after coming out on top of a lap one battle with championship rival Kaylen Frederick.
At the start, Frederick who was on pole had a good launch to lead the pack down to Redgate, holding off Maini who then got a good run on Frederick down the Craner Curves and dived up the inside of his championship rival at the Old Hairpin. Frederick refused to budge, so the pair went wheel to wheel through Starkey’s Bridge and Schwantz with Maini on the outside, before making the move stick on the inside of McLeans.
That set the tone for much of the rest of the race, with Maini able to pull out a steady gap while De Pauw fended off Frederick.
With all that drama going on, Maini had extended his lead to over two seconds, and he was able to pull out further over the following laps, with the margin reaching 3.2 seconds at the end of the eighth lap.
The result meant that Maini claimed his 9th podium in 14 races including the 3rd place on Saturday in round 13. This increases Maini’s championship points to 296 with a lead of 54 points with 10 races still to go.
Winner – Kush Maini, Hitech GP:
“I knew I had to get him [Kaylen Frederick] on the first lap because it’s too hard to follow around here. I got a good start thankfully and put him under pressure into turn one, which messed up his run down to the Old Hairpin. I got a run on him, lunged him into the Old Hairpin, he kept around the outside and then wheel to wheel to McLeans. I braked really late and he had nowhere to go, so I got the move done and I’m really happy.
“When you have fresh air it’s a lot easier to drive and I just put my head down and enjoyed the drive. I did not really push to pull away, I literally just wanted to enjoy the drive and it was really nice.
“There’s still way too many races left [to think about the championship] so we’re just going to keep up this form.”
BRDC British F3 is back in action in two weeks’ time at Snetterton in Norfolk, with four races on 3-4 October.
