Trident and De Palo second in the first race at Le Castellet

The Trident team achieved a third consecutive podium in the Formula Regional European by Alpine. In the first race at the Circuit Paul Ricard in Le Castellet, France, the fifth round of the season, Matteo De Palo took second place after starting from the front row. A clear protagonist in qualifying 1, where he recorded the fastest time, the Roman driver started from the front row.

In the early stages, he attempted to attack leader Freddie Slater, but at the half mark of the race, he had to manage tire degradation. De Palo is on his sixth overall podium finish (including two wins), but has lost the lead in the championship to Slater; the gap is minimal, just 3 points, and the title race is wide open. Ruiqi Liu, who started 15th (one of his best qualifying times), gained two positions to finish the race in 13th, while Nandhavud Bhirombhakdi, who started 17th, finished 15th.

Matteo De Palo: “It was a positive day. In my group, qualifying wasn’t easy because the conditions were mixed, so we couldn’t do exactly what we wanted. For a moment, we risked missing out, but on the last lap we managed to put together a good lap time and took pole, with a nice gap on the second-placed. In the race, we started second and in the first laps I was able to stay quite close to Slater. Then, around mid-race, I began to struggle a bit with tyre degradation and started to lose ground. In the end, though, we were able to maintain the second place, which still brings good points for the championship. Let’s see what we can do tomorrow”.

Ruiqi Liu: “Qualifying was tricky as the rain came at the last moment, but in our group the track was more or less dry. I didn’t really manage to put together what I had or maximise the potential, but it’s definitely a step forward, so we’ll keep pushing tomorrow. The start in the race was quite good, I just need to improve a bit on racecraft and manage the push-to-pass better for overtaking”.

Nandhavud Bhirombhakdi: “It was a difficult race and a tough qualifying session. We need to do a lot better, so full focus on tomorrow”.