MP Motorsport’s Owen Tangavelou said a throttle issue before the Eurocup-3 season opener at Spa-Francorchamps prevented him from starting the race from pole position.

By Juan Arroyo

Tangavelou topped the second session of the collective tests on Thursday, the combined results of which were used to set the grid of race one on Friday after practice was abandoned and qualifying cancelled because of harsh weather conditions.

In preparation for lining up on the grid, Tangavelou and MP Motorsport discovered that his throttle inputs were not being received as they attempted to fire up the car’s engine. The 19-year-old, who is representing Vietnam for the first time in his career after previously competing under the French flag, had become the first driver from the Asian country to secure a pole position in a European single-seater series.

“Me and the team are disappointed with that, but it’s not our mistake,” Tangavelou said. “So we couldn’t have done anything.”

“On the pre-grid, there was when I had to fire up the engine, I pushed the pedal and I pushed the throttle and there was no other power. They tried to fix it on the pre-grid, but they could not and I didn’t make it to the grid,” he continued.

“I’m really happy to be the first Vietnamese [driver] to get a pole in Europe. I was happy also to represent Vietnam in the Vietnamese Motorsports Association this year, and I wished I could have done the race to maybe have a win and being able to fly the Vietnamese flag on the top step of the podium.”

The non-start comes as an early hit to the MP driver’s title aspirations, especially as his teammate Javier Sagrera, who subsequently started from pole, took the victory in the only race of the weekend that took place.

Tangavelou said that after two years in the Formula Regional European Championship, it was his goal to win the title in Eurocup-3, which uses a modified Formula Regional chassis from Tatuus.

“I would say I always focus on being first, and for me, I could have maybe [won] this weekend. In practice, I was fast. In the rain, I was also fast, so I think I would have achieved a win or a podium,” Tangavelou said about what he was expecting heading into his first official Eurocup-3 weekend.

Before the cancellation of race two on Saturday morning, the MP driver was set to start from the back of the grid in 25th, with the order to be set by each driver’s fastest lap in the Friday race.

Other title contenders starting further up the grid could have extended their gaps over Tangavelou in the standings had the race been held. Tangavelou said he didn’t feel lucky that the race had been cancelled, as he thought he “would have gained many positions.”

The Vietnamese driver already proved his speed in the March non-championship round by taking third- and fourth-place finishes. He will be expecting to run at the front at round two next month at the Red Bull Ring, where he will have to make up lost ground in terms of points – but at least not as much as he might have if race two had run on Saturday.

Header photo credit: Niels Broekema / Dutch Photo Agency