Sahara Force India Academy’s and Mumbaikar Jehan Daruvala seemingly had a good weekend at the Marco Simoncelli circuit. This was the 16-year-old’s debut season in Formula Car Racing. Racing in only his second event as a guest driver at the Formula Renault 2.0 ALPS series, Jehan won two pole positions, soon followed by a third and fourth place finishes in the series. He was the quickest in practice and went on to earn his first pole position his 2nd podium of his formula car career at the Misano Adriatico circuit.
In Free Practice 1, Jehan was 4th, but went better in Free Practice 2 to emerge as the quickest. The qualifying session for race 1 started & Jehan waited in the pits initially. He got onto track with just 9 minutes left on the clock, setting a laptime good enough for 3rd on the list. Jehan then put in a scorcher of a lap to bag pole with a time of 1:33.045. He was just 3 thousandths of a second ahead of former championship leader – Jack Aitken. Current championship leader Jake Hughes was 3rd on the list.
The races were a different story altogether. Jehan’s inexperience amongst the seasoned & highly competitive grid showed up as he made a cautious start to fall down to third. By the end of lap 1, Jehan had further fallen to fourth. After settling into a good rhythm, Jehan mounted an attack on the 3rd placed Romanov, of Russia. He soon passed him & sealed the final podium position behind British race winner Jack Aitken & Russian Matevos Isaakyan. Qualifying for race 2 once again saw Jehan extracting the best out of his car. The Sahara Force India Academy racer took his 2nd pole position with a laptime of 1:32.375. His margin much bigger this time as Hughes in 2nd was 0.178 seconds behind while Isaakyan was in the 3rd.
Unfortunately, Jehan was not able to capitalise on his pole once again. After the lights went out, the 16-year-old from Mumbai fell to third. A brief safety car period followed & Jehan remained in 3rd. On lap 7 a small mistake by Jehan saw him fall to 4th. He was not able to gain positions this time & the race was eventually won by Jake Hughes.
After the race, Jehan Daruvala said, “I am really happy with my pace this weekend & a big thank you to the team for a fantastic car. It has been tough racing against the very best racers at the top. I still have a lot to learn & also need to improve my race starts. I am positive about how things are working out & would like to thank Sahara Force India Academy & my family as well.” Jehan’s next event will be at the famous Spa Francorchamps circuit in Belgium as part of the Formula Renault NEC series.
I am joining car racing.