Theodore Prema Racing’s Freddie Slater took a dominant victory in Saturday’s qualifying race for the Macau Grand Prix after starting from second, finishing ahead of KCMG by Pinnacle Motorsport teammates Mari Boya and Theóphile Naël. Feeder Series reviews the Formula Regional World Cup action from Saturday after having spoken to the top four finishers.

By Kaylene Lau

Theóphile Naël started on pole for Saturday’s 10-lap race after leading the way in qualifying, with Slater lining up alongside him. Slater got a perfect launch and immediately challenged Naël for the lead, taking it at the first corner and never looking back for the rest of the race. Naël’s slower launch enabled both Evan Giltaire, who started third, and Mari Boya, who started sixth, to pass him heading into Lisboa.

Meanwhile, at the end of the first lap, Oscar Wurz collided with Charles Leong and touched the rear of Reza Seewooruthun’s car at Melco. The Evans GP driver dragged his car, with damage to the front-right corner and front wing, to the escape road and avoided bringing out the safety car. He was the sole retirement of the race.

By the start of the second lap, Slater was already 1.7 seconds ahead of Giltaire. Boya, running in third, attempted an overtake on Giltaire at Lisboa, but the Frenchman was able to defend his place. As the two behind him fought for positions and Naël closed, Slater extended his lead to 2.6s heading into the third lap. 

Boya attempted a move of his own around the outside of Giltaire at Lisboa on the following lap but couldn’t make the move stick. When he tried again a lap later, Boya made it past and took second, with polesitter Naël making a similar move for third the next lap. Slater, however, was already more than five seconds ahead of Boya at the halfway point of the race.

Behind them, Tymek Kucharczyk in 16th tried to make an overtake on Hiyu Yamakoshi and Jin Nakamura at Lisboa but went wide and had to take to the escape road, dropping to the back of the field. Teammate Chi Zhenrui then fell behind Kucharczyk and start-line staller Enzo Yeh after being given a 10-second stop-and-go penalty for a starting procedure infringement, which he served during the race. 

The order of the podium remained the same for the duration of the race, with Slater taking a dominant victory ahead of Boya with a 5.171s gap. Both Pinnacle drivers made it on the rostrum, with Boya’s teammate Naël rounding out the top three with the fastest lap of the race. Giltaire came home fourth, while Kato fended off Deligny for fifth.

In what was a rarity for Macau, there were no red flags or safety cars, and the session went completely uninterrupted.

Slater was noted for speeding in the pit lane before the race started and was given a fine of €300. 

Slater and Naël are both confirmed to be racing in F3 next year, while Boya is expected to move up to F2. Both series have street tracks on their calendars, with F2 in Baku and Jeddah and both F2 and F3 in Melbourne, Monaco and Madrid. The top three spoke to Feeder Series about how their experience in Macau would help them in their campaigns next year when it came to tackling street circuits. 

“I don’t think anywhere can compare like this, but I think it’s more the approach – to have that balance between pushing on entry compared to exit, that sort of approach to how you drive a street track is completely different,” Slater said.

“It’s also how you build throughout the weekend. It’s not like you can go out in FP1 and go full guns blazing. You have to take your time and gain confidence in yourself and the car. However, if you go to tracks that are open, normal tracks, you can push a lot harder earlier on, so I think it’s a really good lesson for my future and all future drivers.” 

“The most important thing from this weekend is the experience. It is a weekend where we drive the most [on a street circuit], and it’s a good way to learn and try different approaches,” Boya said. “All the kilometres we have done this weekend are a lot compared to a normal F3 weekend.” 

Before their races, F3 and F2 weekends offer one 45-minute practice session and one 30-minute qualifying session or, in Monaco, a split qualifying session with 16 minutes per group. In Macau, FR drivers get two 40-minute practice sessions and two 40-minute qualifying sessions across two days.

“This track you have to push yourself to the wall, you have to be on the limit every time, especially on the braking. That’s where you can find some time,” Naël said. “We get a lot more mileage this weekend compared to an F3 weekend, so I think it’s really helpful for the driver.”

Boya’s and Naël’s results also combined for one of Pinnacle Motorsport’s strongest days in motorsport in recent years. The drivers set the two fastest laps overall, with a 2:15.561 for Naël and Boya half a second slower.

“We’re very satisfied,” team principal John O’Hara told Feeder Series. “A lot of today was to do with track position. We were a little bit unlucky on the run to Lisboa on lap one. Théo got squeezed into the wall at the lift. Mari made a cracking start, but by the time they cleared the ART car, the gap was too big. But the gap didn’t open after that. In fact, it closed after that, and our straight line speed in sector one is very, very good.” 

The cars’ low-downforce setup makes the cars especially fast on the approach to Lisboa, the primary overtaking spot on the circuit. 

“We believe that’s the fastest way to get around the circuit, so we’re sticking with that. There will be a few small changes for tomorrow once the engineers go through everything with the driver,” O’Hara said. “We know we can’t take anything for granted, but I feel we’re right in the mix.”

Giltaire was second for the first few laps but was overtaken by both Pinnacle cars and missed out on a podium in what he described as a ‘tough race’. 

“Tyres were a bit more difficult on my side. I had a lot of deg already at the beginning from yesterday’s quali with the worst set for today, and we keep the best set for the main race, which is logical,” the ART Grand Prix driver told Feeder Series. “We’ll try to find some stuff to improve, a little bit on the car and the tyres to improve, but mainly on my side to get confidence and be able to push as I want.” 

“It has been also difficult to prepare the tyres as much,” he added. “It’s really important to prepare and to be able to extract 100 per cent of the car for qualifying and the race, so tomorrow [it] will be the key to be able to make everything work directly at the start until T3, and following and also pushing into the middle section.” 

Sunday’s main race for the FR World Cup will start at 15:30 local time. 

Additional reporting by Michael McClure

Header photo credit: Macau Grand Prix Organizing Committee