Bianca Bustamante fights through challenging Silverstone weekend in Eurocup-3
Bianca Bustamante continued to show her fighting spirit during a challenging Eurocup-3 weekend at Silverstone, battling some technical issues affecting her driving in Race 1 before completing the second contest in difficult weather conditions. The Palou Motorsport driver nevertheless made progress from her starting position in the first race, including a four-place gain on the opening lap.
Bianca Bustamante continued to show her fighting spirit during a challenging Eurocup-3 Championship weekend at Silverstone, battling some technical issues affecting her driving in Race 1 before completing the second contest in difficult weather conditions.
The Palou Motorsport driver nevertheless made progress from her starting position in the first race, including a four-place gain on the opening lap, and continued to improve her lap times throughout the weekend.
Bustamante arrived at Silverstone looking to build on the encouraging progress she had shown throughout her rookie Eurocup-3 Championship campaign with Palou Motorsport, despite that improvement not always translating into outright results due to some misfortunes.
Stepping up to the competitive Eurocup-3 series in 2026, the Filipina has steadily adapted to the Dallara 326 while developing her racecraft and consistency against an experienced international field. After scoring her first top-20 finish of the season at Paul Ricard, Bustamante took another significant step forward at Portimão with a career-best 14th place before continuing that momentum at Imola, where three consecutive top-20 finishes highlighted her growing confidence and increasingly competitive pace. At Monza, she again showed that progress with particularly strong speed in qualifying and a consistent fight inside the top 20 in Race 1, although a technical problem on the formation lap ultimately prevented her from taking the start of Sunday's second race.
Silverstone provided another opportunity to continue that progression at a circuit Bustamante already knew from her GB3 Championship campaign in 2025, although the experience was of limited reference given the significantly different machinery used in Eurocup-3. The weekend began in particularly difficult conditions, with the sole practice session held on a wet track. With the conditions changing considerably throughout the session, however, the practice order offered limited indication of the true competitive picture.
Qualifying later in the day was held in very different conditions on a dry track. Bustamante recorded a 1:53.127 in Q1 to qualify 24th for the opening race before improving further in Q2, where her 1:52.360 placed her 23rd on the grid for Race 2.
A carry-over penalty from the previous round meant Bustamante started Race 1 from 29th rather than her qualifying position, but she immediately began making up ground when the race got underway. Under cloudy skies but without rain, the Filipina made an excellent launch and passed four cars off the line, moving up to 24th by Turn 1 and completing a particularly strong opening lap.
The early progress was interrupted when the Safety Car was deployed after Kolovos was stranded on track, but Bustamante again made good use of the restart when racing resumed at the end of lap three. She immediately attacked Beckley and completed the move on lap four to take 23rd, before turning her attention to Feldmann ahead.
Bustamante was quicker than the car in front and, once she found clear air, began producing competitive lap times below the 1:55 mark, including a 1:54.4. Her pace allowed her to remain within striking distance of Feldmann, although she soon came under pressure from behind. Kluss recovered the position a lap later, with Hedley also moving past shortly afterwards, leaving Bustamante in 25th. Tunon then completed another move on lap seven, dropping her to 26th.
Bustamante continued to push and progressively improved through all three sectors, recording a 1:53.777 as she attempted to stay with Feldmann. Her pace was particularly strong in the final sector, where she was gradually reducing the gap and remaining close enough to capitalise on any battle ahead.
A fight between Kluss and Tunon provided that opportunity, as the two cars ahead became embroiled in a close battle and allowed Feldmann and Bustamante to close back in. Bustamante was unable to immediately convert the opportunity into another overtaking move, however, and instead had to switch her attention to defending from Macia.
Macia eventually completed the pass on lap 12, leaving Bustamante 26th as the race entered its closing stages. Heuzenroeder subsequently went off into the gravel as the field began the final lap, but Bustamante remained focused on the cars ahead and stayed close to Macia, who was later handed a five-second penalty for track limits.
That allowed Bustamante to recover one position at the chequered flag, taking 25th place after successfully keeping Macia within range. Her final result nevertheless understated the difficulty of the race, as Bustamante had been dealing throughout the contest with a technical issue that made downshifting difficult and cost her valuable time.
Sunday morning brought an entirely different challenge for Race 2, with Silverstone once again wet and large amounts of water spray making visibility and grip particularly difficult. Starting from 23rd, Bustamante initially settled into 25th after the opening corners but quickly demonstrated her ability to adapt, making up two positions on the second lap by passing Kluss and Barbuy to return to 23rd.
Kluss immediately fought back, and Bustamante was forced to defend her position while continuing to find improvements in the changing conditions. She recorded a 2:11.3 through the opening sector and established more than a second of breathing room behind her, while also gradually closing the gap to Feldmann ahead. By lap four she was finding additional tenths as the circuit began to improve slightly.
Bustamante lowered her time to 2:10.944, but Campos was closing rapidly and eventually found a way past on lap six, dropping the Palou Motorsport driver back to 25th. Once again, Bianca responded with a 2:09.767 before improving sectors one and two on the following lap and recording a 2:09.400.
With clearer space both ahead and behind, Bustamante was able to concentrate on her own rhythm during the final stages and continued to make incremental gains despite the extremely difficult conditions. She extended her advantage over Macia to around two seconds during the closing laps and brought the Dallara 326 home in 25th position, then promoted to P24.
The Silverstone weekend ultimately proved another difficult but valuable learning experience for Bustamante, with technical problems making the challenge even harder and the constantly changing weather preventing her from establishing a consistent reference from one session to the next. Nevertheless, the Filipina continued to demonstrate the fighting spirit that has characterised her campaign, making strong starts, recovering positions and progressively improving her pace in both races.
Bustamante will now look to convert that progress back into a top-20 result at the next Eurocup-3 round, which takes the championship to Jerez from September 25-27.
