MACAU 19 NOVEMBER 2011: British Formula 3 Champion Felipe Nasr will start tomorrow’s 58th Macau Grand Prix from the front row of the grid after being beaten narrowly to victory in today’s qualification race on the streets of the former Portuguese colony.

The race was won by pole man Marco Wittmann for the Signature team, with Nasr’s Carlin car less than a second behind. Felipe’s hopes of seizing victory were dashed by the late-race arrival on track of the safety car, and by the looming presence of Roberto Merhi in his mirrors, the Spanish Prema driver having battled up from eighth.

Nasr, who started fifth, profited when Alexander Sims crashed his Tom’s Dallara-Toyota on his out lap and failed to make the grid, and when Antonio Felix da Costa’s Hitech car, which lined up second, suffered a mechanical failure on the line.

“From the start I got two places straight away,” said Nasr. “I was third into the first corner and managed to get a good tow from Bottas and we were three wide into Lisboa. I was in the middle so I didn’t have the right line to come out first and I was cautious not to make contact. I managed to come out in second though and then I just focused on keeping the car out of the walls so we could have a good position for tomorrow.

“Both Wittmann and Merhi were very quick; Wittmann had a strong car in the middle sector, but I was fast in the final sector and was able to close on him there and pull away from Merhi a little. I think we need to look at the data to see how we can improve further so we are even stronger tomorrow, but second place is a great position to start from in Macau.”

William Buller was the leading British finisher in 13th, just ahead of his Fortec team-mate Lucas Foresti.

Tomorrow’s Grand Prix is at 1530 local time, 0730 GMT.

 

Macau GP – qualification race provisional results

1. Marco Wittmann Signature Dallara-VW 25m 03.719s

2. Felipe Nasr Carlin Dallara-VW + 0.867s

3. Roberto Merhi Prema Dallara-Merc + 3.483s

4. Valtteri Bottas Double R Dallara-Merc + 4.270s

5. Carlos Huertas Carlin Dallara-VW + 4.850s

6. Daniel Juncadella Prema Dallara-Merc + 5.381s

7. Laurens Vanthoor Signature Dallara-VW + 6.512s

8. Daniel Abt Signature Dallara-VW + 7.228s

9. Kimiya Sato Motopark Dallara-VW + 8.154s

10. Hannes van Asseldonk Hitech Dallara-VW + 9.337s etc

Full results http://bit.ly/vXtuhA

Article Written By Nick Carter on 19th Nov 2011