From third on the grid Quinn flew past Logan Sargeant to take second place. He was then in hot pursuit of poleman Jamie Caroline who built an early advantage of several seconds in the wet conditions caused by a rain shower prior to the race.
Quinn responded brilliantly as the race progressed, reducing the gap by one second. However, Caroline had just enough pace in hand to control the gap to Quinn who himself had to protect his advantage over the hard-charging Linus Lundqvist late on.
Oscar Piastri started alongside Quinn on the second row of the grid and despite also finding a way past Sargeant, he lost out to a couple of drivers in the opening exchanges as he found his feet in his first wet British F4 race.
He was soon locked in a thrilling battle with Harry Webb who put him under pressure for a large part of the race, trying to force the Aussie to make a mistake. Piastri was resolute in his defence and did well to keep Webb at bay; putting daylight between them in the closing laps as he grew more comfortable in the drying conditions.
Ayrton Simmons made an excellent start from eighth, immediately gaining a couple of places, but contact early on with Oliver York left him with an uphill battle. A nosecone change put him out of contention, but he took advantage of the track time to gather valuable data, treating the remainder of the race as a test session.
The TRS Arden trio are back in action at 14:05 this afternoon with Piastri starting from pole position and bidding for his first win of the campaign.
Alex Quinn: “It’s nice to be on the podium. Jamie and I were very similar in terms of pace. We were quick in different parts of the track though. I was quick in the technical
parts of the track, but not quite as quick in the faster parts. The race was challenging with wet and dry conditions. It was a fun race to drive and I’m happy with the podium. I was trying to cool the tyres down at the end, looking for the damp patches on the circuit. I saw Lundqvist was catching me. He was very quick towards the end whereas we were very quick at the beginning.”
Oscar Piastri: “My start wasn’t great and the first couple of laps weren’t great for me in general. I had that battle with Harry and then after that it was a pretty lonely race. Once I got up to speed I think I had pretty good pace, but by that time the gap to cars ahead was too big to close in the remaining laps. I think we have a good chance from pole in the next race regardless of the conditions. I really want to convert it into my first British F4 win.”
Ayrton Simmons: “I got off to a really good a start. I was behind Oscar and overtook two cars off the line. I was absolutely on it through the first few corners, but then contact with York effectively ended my race. So far it’s just not been my weekend really. I tried to treat the rest of the race as a test session, learning and gathering data.”