Practice report

Formula V8 3.5

Mixed day for Draco Racing in Red Bull Ring

Now the technical staff is at work to prepare the cars for tomorrow's Qualifying session, scheduled for 8.50 AM.

Published: Jul 19, 2013, 8:08 PM

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Nico Müller

Draco Racing experienced a mixed Friday in Spielberg, where F.Renault 3.5 is holding the 6th round of the 2013 season. On the Austrian track owned by Red Bull, the Italian team boasted a very good pace in the morning Free Practice session, Nico Muller finishing as high as P5 and André Negrao posting some very quick laptimes on used rubber too.

Nico Müller

Photo by: DPPI

That seemed the premise to a good first day of running but in the afternoon, in much hotter air and track temperatures, grip conditions changed drastically and the Draco drivers found themselves sliding too much: Muller closed the session in 18th place, while Negrao did a bit better posting the 14th quickest time, still far from the team's aims.

Now the technical staff is at work to prepare the cars for tomorrow's Qualifying session, scheduled for 8.50 AM. The cars will then line-up on the Race 1 grid at 2.30 PM.

Nico Muller (FP1 - P5; FP2 – P18): “It was an odd day. In the morning the car felt good and I was happy with 5th place considering that we weren't going for performance at all. Then in the afternoon everything changed and I found myself struggling for grip, the car was just sliding around. We didn't perform any major setup change on the car between the two sessions so it's hard to understand what happened, but we'll work hard to find out".

Andrè Negrao (FP1 – P21; FP2 – P14): “In the morning the car setup was quite ok but I couldn't find a clear lap on new rubber and that's why my final position doesn't reflect my performance potential. The second practice was much more difficult: I had no grip at all so we have a lot of work to do before tomorrow's qualifying. Furthermore, the timed session will be held early in the morning, so temperatures will be colder than anything we experienced today. Some guessing will be required in order to find the best setup".

Draco Racing

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