Team BRM’s Italian charger Marco Mapelli has secured his first two podium finishes of his young Formula 3 racing career following a competitive weekend for the Adelaide-based Italian at Phillip Island in Victoria at the weekend.
It was a fantastic performance from 18-year-old Marco as he drove two aggressive races in his #4 Team BRM / Gawler Farm Machinery Dallara F304 Spiess to score a haul of championship points and double his score in the Gold Star championship standings – leaping up to sixth place with five rounds to go.
Mapelli qualified third for each race, missing second place by just. 02s in qualifying one and, in a similar performance, missing pole position by less than two-tenths of a second.
In race one Mapelli fought a race-long battle with the vastly more experienced Charlie Hollings, falling short at the line by just. 05s after concerted attacks on the British driver for a majority of the race.
In race two he was again involved in many dices and brought the car home cleanly in another podium finish. Incredibly, he completed almost two thirds of the race with a cut and deflating tyre after an earlier contact with another car.
Showing his incredible natural talent, Mapelli set his fastest lap on the eighth of fourteen before slowing to conserve the tyre in order to finish.
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