Prema Racing’s Zak O’Sullivan took home his second race victory of the 2023 FIA Formula 3 season in Barcelona, leading from lights to flag after weathering a tough battle with fellow Williams academy driver Luke Browning and a late safety car period. Feeder Series spoke trackside with both O’Sullivan and Prema team principal René Rosin about the opening F3 race of the Spanish Grand Prix weekend.

By Daniele Spadi

Second-year F3 racer O’Sullivan started on reverse-grid pole after posting the 12th fastest time on Friday around the recently reconfigured Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. The Briton got a good start, but he had to defend hard in the middle part of the race from Browning, who was trying to take the lead from him.

Though the Hitech driver tried his best, O’Sullivan kept his cool – and the lead of the race – until the very end. This was the first on-track victory for the Prema driver, who had previously inherited the sprint victory in Melbourne following Franco Colapinto’s disqualification.

“[The race was] quite tricky. I think DRS seems a bit more powerful than perhaps last year on the old layout because of the higher speed we’re opening it,” the Briton told Feeder Series. “Early on, [Browning] was quite fast. We were three times side by side into Turn 1, and then towards the end, I started to open up the gap a little bit and it was a bit easier.”

After the safety car was deployed on the opening lap of the race until the fourth lap, O’Sullivan also had to face a late safety car period from laps 16 to 18 that bunched up the field and gave Browning one last shot at the race lead.

But the Prema driver’s restarts were faultless both times, as he built a gap large enough to avoid getting attacked into turn one on both occasions.

“With the new layout, we’re kind of the guinea pigs as to when to go on the restart. I decided to go pretty early because the aero wash is quite bad around Turns 13 and 14, and it seemed to work both times.”

Praise from Prema boss Rosin

Team principal René Rosin told Feeder Series that he was impressed with O’Sullivan’s efforts in a challenging sprint race.

“The race has been difficult like expected here in Barcelona. The DRS has a huge effect, but Zak defended pretty well,” Rosin said. “I think he did a solid race. Of course I’m expecting a bit more overall – not from him but from the team – because we want to always fight for the top positions. But of course, after some misfortune in Monaco, I think it’s a good result. It’s solid points for him and for the championship, but also for the team overall.”

When asked about O’Sullivan’s potential as a team leader, Rosin said he expected the Briton to stay at the sharp end.

“My point has always been the same: we need to look race by race and maximise every time the potential. Zak was fighting for pole position in Bahrain and in Melbourne. He has the lap on him to make pole position, so honestly I’m expecting [of] him – now that we are getting back on the European circuits that he knows – that he will be there fighting for the top positions.”

High expectations for the feature race

In tomorrow’s race, the 18-year-old will start from the sixth row on the grid after failing to make the top 10 in qualifying. What allowed him to start at the front of the field today could ultimately hinder him during the feature race, which offers more points.

“Obviously we would like to be at the front for tomorrow’s race. I think the key is really qualifying,” O’Sullivan told Feeder Series, “and that’s our place to work on. Race pace has always not been too bad.”

However, the Briton said he was confident ahead of the final race of the weekend. “I hope so. The race pace seemed quite strong,” he said when asked if he could attack during tomorrow’s feature race. “More importantly, the degradation wasn’t too bad for me. I think before the safety car, I started to open the gap [to Browning], which was quite promising. So hopefully we can play that to our advantage from behind tomorrow and see if we can make some moves.”

A championship hopeful?

Now eighth in the drivers’ standings on 37 points, O’Sullivan still has his eyes on the prize for the remainder of the season. Despite being 43 points behind championship leader Gabriel Bortoleto after seven races, he told Feeder Series that he thinks there’s still plenty of time to get back in the title hunt with the feature race and five more rounds to go.

“We saw last year, especially Zane [Maloney] where he was at this point in 2022,” he explained. “It’s a long season. Things can go up and down, and the points spread is so big in the top 10 really. One or two good weekends, especially feature race points, propel you up the order quite quickly.”

Additional reporting by Jim Kimberley

Header photo credit: Prema Racing