Interview
Nerea Martí tops both sessions in Day 1 of testing in Valencia
Nerea Martí topped both sessions across six hours of testing in Valencia today, as she continued to impress on home soil.
This week’s testing at Valencia gave the teams the chance to work on any challenges they encountered on the weekend and fine tune set-ups ahead of the next round at the Circuit Barcelona de Catalunya.
The field of fifteen cars completed over 1000 laps ahead of the second day of testing tomorrow.
Campos Racing driver Martí had a strong weekend in her home event in Valencia, achieving a podium in two races out of three, and she was delighted with a great day for testing, setting the fastest time of the day with a 1:33.702.
She said: “Testing was really, really positive because we tried a lot of changes and I think we are going in the right direction. I was really fast with both new and old tyres, and we are working a lot with the team. We did a good step from Spielberg to Valencia, and I think we will take another step forward in Barcelona and be really fast."
Chloe Grant, driver for ART Grand Prix, was fourth in the morning session, only 0.3s off the fastest time of the day. She commented: “Testing was positive - the morning session I was really happy with P4 and my driving has definitely progressed a lot. The car feels really, really good so it is a bit of a shame it didn’t quite work out at the race weekend, but the weekend was still great as we made a lot of progress and were much better than Austria.”
Rodin Carlin were looking forward to getting some more time on track to work on their package heading into Barcelona, with Team Manager Kenny Kirwan saying: “We have been working through a fairly extensive package based on what we have learnt from the Red Bull Ring and Valencia races. We are still trying to develop the package forward and we are quite confident that we will be able to bring something a bit more special to Barcelona.”
Tomorrow, Day 2 of testing will kick off at 09:00, with another six hours of running planned across the day.
2023 F1 ACADEMY - VALENCIA TEST, DAY 1, MORNING SESSION
| DRIVER | LICENCE | TEAM | LAPTIME | LAPS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nerea Martí | ESP | Campos Racing | 1:33.702 | 35 |
| 2 | Hamda Al Qubaisi | ARE | MP Motorsport | 1:33.844 | 34 |
| 3 | Lena Bühler | CHE | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.096 | 36 |
| 4 | Chloe Grant | GBR | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.260 | 29 |
| 5 | Lola Lovinfosse | FRA | Campos Racing | 1:34.282 | 38 |
| 6 | Abbi Pulling | GBR | Rodin Carlin | 1:34.354 | 35 |
| 7 | Amna Al Qubaisi | ARE | MP Motorsport | 1:34.355 | 34 |
| 8 | Marta García | ESP | PREMA Racing | 1:34.375 | 42 |
| 9 | Maite Cáceres | URY | Campos Racing | 1:34.428 | 39 |
| 10 | Carrie Schreiner | DEU | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.445 | 33 |
| 11 | Bianca Bustamante | PHL | PREMA Racing | 1:34.505 | 41 |
| 12 | Emely de Heus | NLD | MP Motorsport | 1:34.730 | 37 |
| 13 | Chloe Chong | GBR | PREMA Racing | 1:34.867 | 36 |
| 14 | Jessica Edgar | GBR | Rodin Carlin | 1:35.035 | 34 |
| 15 | Megan Gilkes | CAN | Rodin Carlin | 1:35.397 | 31 |
2023 F1 ACADEMY - VALENCIA TEST, DAY 1, AFTERNOON SESSION
| DRIVER | LICENCE | TEAM | LAPTIME | LAPS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nerea Martí | ESP | Campos Racing | 1:34.101 | 32 |
| 2 | Hamda Al Qubaisi | ARE | MP Motorsport | 1:34.175 | 33 |
| 3 | Abbi Pulling | GBR | Rodin Carlin | 1:34.250 | 25 |
| 4 | Marta García | ESP | PREMA Racing | 1:34.296 | 30 |
| 5 | Lola Lovinfosse | FRA | Campos Racing | 1:34.413 | 31 |
| 6 | Amna Al Qubaisi | ARE | MP Motorsport | 1:34.745 | 30 |
| 7 | Lena Bühler | CHE | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.843 | 37 |
| 8 | Jessica Edgar | GBR | Rodin Carlin | 1:34.906 | 28 |
| 9 | Carrie Schreiner | DEU | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.908 | 28 |
| 10 | Bianca Bustamante | PHL | PREMA Racing | 1:34.951 | 41 |
| 11 | Chloe Grant | GBR | ART Grand Prix | 1:34.999 | 32 |
| 12 | Emely de Heus | NLD | MP Motorsport | 1:35.001 | 36 |
| 13 | Megan Gilkes | CAN | Rodin Carlin | 1:35.129 | 23 |
| 14 | Maite Cáceres | URG | Campos Racing | 1:35.310 | 43 |
| 15 | Chloe Chong | GBR | PREMA Racing | 1:35.825 | 28 |