After qualifying misfortune, Sophia Floersch stunned the Red Bull Ring with an impressive comeback from last on the grid to finish 6th in the first race of the Austrian weekend.
Just one week after the Hungaroring round, Formula Regional is back this weekend in Austria, on the iconic Red Bull Ring.
Sophia Floersch enjoyed very positive Friday practice sessions, finishing respectively fourth and third.
"Pretty happy with how it went." - she commented. "For being here for the first time with the team and the Regional F3 we are looking strong".
Unfortunately her pace didn't translate into profitable starting positions, as today's qualifying came to a premature end for the German lady after technical issues in the opening stages of the session.
With no valuable time set, Floersch will have to start all three races from the back of the grid.
After a good start in the first race, Sophia immediately managed to gain two positions and completed the first lap ahead of Sharon Scolari and VAR teammate Alexandre Bardinon.
The impressive charge continued, as Floersch successfully gained two more positions on Lappalainen and Blomqvist with exciting overtakes.
Soon after, the race lighted up again with the driver of the #99 Van Amersfoort entry putting on an impressive show in the duel with Beckhauser for ninth position.
On lap 9, Bardinon went off and brought out the Safety Car.
At the restart Floersch was protagonist of an excellent move that allowed her to overtake both Beckhauser and Nannini at the same time, with the young German moving up to eight place.
In probably one of her best performances so far in the Formula Regional European Championship, Sophia Floersch kept the momentum and moved into P7 with yet another determined pass on Caldwell.
On the last lap of the race, a four-cars fierce battle arose for third place, with Fittipaldi, Guzman and Siebert all fighting for the last step of the podium.
Floersch, who had closed in on the group of cars in front of her, took advantage of a mistake by Siebert (who went off the track before rejoining eleventh), to gain one last position, as she completed a phenomenal recovery to take sixth under the chequered flag.
Race 1 at the Red Bull Ring was again won by series dominator Frederick Vesti for Prema Powerteam. Igor Fraga took second and David Schumacher completed the podium.
Swiss Sharon Scolari finished P13.
"Had some technical problems on my first timed lap in Quali 1 and couldn’t continue for both Qualis, which makes me start from last in all three races. Mega job by my two mechanics for getting the car ready on time for the race." - the young lady commented via her social media feeds. "Will fight even harder tomorrow. Let’s see what we will be able to do".
With today's 8 points, Floersch retains 7th in championship standings at 62, just 4 points behind Raul Guzman.
Tomorrow's race 2 from the Austrian venue will take place at 09:40 local.
In Sophia's words:
"Will fight even harder tomorrow. Let’s see what we will be able to do"
Ph credits: ACI Sport