Mahaveer Raghunathan logs in a creditable 7th on Day 2; puts in another 59 laps on final day

Barcelona, 7 March 2019: Nyck de Vries has once again topped the timesheets in the final day of the FIA Formula 2 pre-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona. The ART Grand Prix driver set a laptime of 1:27.024 in the morning session to head Luca Ghiotto and Louis Delétraz. In the afternoon, Juan Manuel Correa was quickest.

Earlier on Day 2, Indian racer Mahaveer Raghunathan of MP Motorsport put in 39 laps and logged in a creditable seventh fastest time. After learning the nuances of motorsport in karting, Mahaveer graduated to Formula cars in 2012 by competing in the JK Racing Asia Series. In 2013, he drove in the MRF Challenge Formula 1600. He also participated in three races of the Chinese Formula Masters. In 2014, Mahaveer moved to Europe and joined F&M in the Italian Formula 4 Championship. In 2015, he participated in the European Formula 3 championship for Motopark Academy. The 2016 season was his most productive with second overall finish in the Auto GP racing for Coloni’s Italian team PS Racing. At the end of the season, he weighed various options and even tested GP2 cars in Abu Dhabi. In 2017, he won the BOSS GP-Formula Class Championship with the Italian Team Coloni Racing securing 13 podiums out of 14 races and ended the season as Champion.

Day 3 of testing opened in sunny conditions. Nicholas Latifi was the first driver to hit the track whilst de Vries set the early pace ahead of Ghiotto. The Dutchman improved further to set a time of 1:27.576 in the first half hour of the running. Carlin’s drivers Delétraz and Nobuharu Matsushita also broke the 1m28s barrier to move up to second and third respectively.

The drivers switched from Medium to Soft tyres and Ghiotto went top in a 1:27.263 whilst teammate Guanyu Zhou moved up to second (+0.191s). De Vries also found some extra pace to clock in a blazing laptime of 1:27.024 as Delétraz went third quickest behind Ghiotto.

Just before the midway point, the man of the day de Vries spun and stopped at Turn 2 bringing out a red flag. The remainder of the session was dedicated to race simulations and pit stop practices. At the chequered flag the top 3 remained unchanged. Zhou, Matsushita, Nikita Mazepin, Jack Aitken, Sérgio Sette Câmara, Sean Gelael and Ralph Boschung rounded up the top 10.

After a one-hour break, the pit lane re-opened. Delétraz was the first man back on track ten minutes later. Soon after that Roberto Merhi signed the quickest laptime to sit pretty at the top of the timesheets ahead of Tatiana Calderon and Boschung.

It was a studious afternoon for the teams and the drivers who once again focused on long runs. Twenty minutes before the chequered flag, Correa went fastest by three tenths over Merhi. Calderon ended third ahead of Boschung, Richard Verschoor (who replaced Jordan King at MP Motorsport today), Sette Câmara, Matsushita, Gelael, Aitken and Latifi.

This concluded the pre-season testing for the FIA Formula 2 Championship. It’s time for the teams to pack up and get ready for the first Round of the 2019 season which will kick off at the Bahrain International circuit on March 29-31.