Valuable points on a nostalgic place
The FIA CEZ F4 Championship continued last weekend weekend in Most, Czech Republic, with the start of the second half of the championship’s season, where the drivers had to compete in three races. In addition, the extreme weather conditions made things difficult for the field, sometimes overturning the paperwork.
Gender Racing was back on this track after more than ten years and in a completely new championship series with a new technique. This is why the more than 40 laps of the three free practice sessions were particularly useful, allowing the team to find the right settings.
In a rather close qualifying session, Gender Racing Team's Oliver Michl qualified sixth on the grid. Saturday's qualifying was followed by the first race in the afternoon, which was still on a dry track. The GRT driver finished the race in sixth position. For the two races on Sunday, the weather changed the scenario quite a bit, as the track was hit by a considerable amount of rain in several waves. This brought out the wet tyres and the teams had to adjust their set-up for the wet track. In the second race, the field started with a rolling start behind the safety car, but the wet track still gave the drivers a hard time. The race was characterised by a lot of slips and spin-outs, with Oliver taking the chequered flag in seventh place. The third race started on a slowly drying track, but unfortunately the final race was the least fortunate for the GRT driver. Unfortunately, after hardly hitting a kerb, the front wing of the F4 T-421 was damaged which was forcing Oliver to make a pit stop. The team carried out a quick nose change, but this meant that he could only finish the race at the back of the field. Nevertheless, the GRT driver scored valuable points this race weekend and with 76 points, he now sits fifth in the championship standings and is looking forward to the rest of the season:
"The track is very new to me and the weather has been very changeable and we've had more successful races before, but this weekend we were a little less lucky and the results didn't come today as we expected. After a pretty good start I managed to catch up with the guys in front of me and was going at such a good pace that I felt I could overtake them, but then unfortunately some of us went through the cones in one of the corners and my front wing broke off so I had to go into the pits to change the front wing. Apart from that, I really enjoyed this exciting, fast track."
Team manager Tamás Gender was personally present at this championship round, and his team also had an enthusiastic student assistant for the weekend in the person of his son, Tamás Gender Junior:
"We are on a very exciting track in Most. The Gender Racing Team used to race with Formula Renaults here more than 10 years ago. Back then, this venue was on the calendar. After that we didn't come here for a long, long time and now we are back with the Formula 4 category. The atmosphere is very nostalgic. Oliver started the free practices very with a strong pace as we only got a couple of tenths from the fastest drivers which was very encouraging for the weekend. Our first race went well in dry conditions. For the second race, the rain arrived this morning, which we didn't expect. We made the decision very quickly and adapted the car to the wet settings, but Oliver has very few test kilometres with this car in rainy conditions. This was reflected in the lap times in the first laps, but as we progressed and the more laps he had in his hands, he got faster lap after lap, which gives us confidence for the future. My son and I came from a test in Cremona, Italy, and before that he had a race in Lonato. Now he has this two-week summer break, which he doesn't want to spend like doing nothing. He just had the opportunity to come to the Gender Racing Team’s race weekend where he is always keen to learn and help out. Moreover, these race weekends are also important for his future, as he is preparing for a career as a formula racing driver after karting and he always comes to the Gender Racing Team’ races and other formula car races too with a lot of motivation."
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