Croft: Hitech Racing Friday notes

HITECH OFF TO FLYING START

Marko Asmer and the Hitech Racing team got their title bid off to a great start by twice posting the quickest lap in official testing at the Croft track today. Estonian Asmer and the Silverstone-based team wound up just six hundredths of a second quicker than Niall Breen and more importantly main rival Maro Engel ahead of this weekend's penultimate round of the Lloyds TSB Insurance British Formula 3 International Series.

Marko's team-mate Walter Grubmuller finished the day 12th quickest, on 1:14.639, less than a second off Asmer's quickest time of 1:13.765 and both drivers head into tomorrow's qualifying confident of improving their times. For the David Hayle-led team, victory this weekend could give them the title they so richly deserve following nine wins and eight pole positions so far this season but Hayle refuses to get complacent.

"Being quickest today has obviously given us all a real boost but it's only testing and tomorrow will be the real test," said David. "Marko drove well in both sessions and I'm confident he can reproduce that form when it comes to the crucial qualifying sessions tomorrow.

"Walter has driven superbly too, after Rockingham when he really got to grips with things and narrowly missed out on the fourth quickest time, he's full of confidence and I'm fairly certain that come tomorrow we should be looking at a top six or seventh quickest time from him."

Qualifying kicks off proceedings tomorrow with two 30 minute sessions taking place at 11.40 and 14.30 with the two races scheduled to start on Sunday at 12.50 and 16.05.

-credit: hr