Two Strong Finishes for Mitch Evans on European Racing Debut

Kiwi sensation Mitch Evans made his European racing debut at Istanbul Park last weekend. The 16-year-old had never previously raced a GP3 car, or driven at the Turkish Grand Prix venue, and he left quite an impression on his rivals.

“As this was my first time at Istanbul Park,” says Mitch, “I wasn’t expecting too much from the weekend. I set myself the goal of finishing inside the top 10 and I was able to realise that ambition from the outset when I set the fifth fastest lap in Friday’s wet first practice session.”

Following that wet first session, Mitch went into qualifying with only 30 minutes of dry running in second practice under his belt and he pulled out a fabulous lap to line up seventh. His qualifying time of 1:45.668s was just 0.2s off pole position and the top 25 cars were separated by just one second.

In race one, Mitch had a good battle with former McLaren Autosport Young Driver of the Year Alexander Sims and he got the better of the Englishman on the penultimate lap when Sims ran wide. He finished sixth. In race two, tyre degradation was more of a factor and Mitch finished seventh

“I learnt a lot in both of the races,” says Mitch. “My pace at the start of race one was good and I had a good battle with Antonio Felix da Costa and Alex Sims.

“Race two was more of an exercise in damage limitation because my rear tyres started to go away at quite an early stage and I had to defend hard. I lost sixth place at the end of the final lap, which was frustrating, but it’s been a very positive weekend on the whole. The whole team has done a great job and I’m hoping for even better performance in Barcelona.”

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