Ticktum’s second Macau GP success
Red Bull Junior Dan Ticktum was unbeatable on the way to his second Macau GP triumph, in a race marred by a horrific shunt
Dan Ticktum is now a twotime Macau Grand Prix winner, and the manner of his victory last weekend on the famed Guia circuit was crushing, whereas in 2017 it was rather less so. “The best way to describe it would be to say ‘less surprising but more enjoyable’,” he reflected in the wake of his latest triumph. “I don’t want to sound overly cocky, but it’s been a pretty perfect weekend on my part and the team’s part.”
That’s not cocky at all – it’s a perfect summation of the event. No-one had an answer to the pace of Ticktum or, once he’d got up to second place, his Motopark team-mate Joel Eriksson. As it had done in 2017, the German squad had the edge through qualifying and the two races. Nobody could match Ticktum’s sector times on the challenging mountain section of the course, for which you need a bit of downforce, yet other teams were scratching their heads that they couldn’t match the Motopark pace on the flat-out blast from R Bend to Lisboa either.
It was that blast that, sadly, precipitated the accident that overshadowed Ticktum’s victory. Macau 2018 will be remembered for the shocking crash involving Sophia Florsch and Sho Tsuboi. Thankfully, it will also be remembered for the fact that none of the five people hurt sustained life-threatening injuries – and that’s a miracle.
Four cars had shunted at Lisboa on the opening lap, meaning the safety car was called. Ticktum made a perfect restart to enter lap four with a handy advantage over second-placed Sacha Fenestraz, who had Eriksson tucked into his slipstream. The first sign that something odd was happening was when Eriksson backed out of what seemed to be an easy pass on the Carlin car of Fenestraz on the approach to Lisboa. This wasn’t the fighting form we normally expect of the BMW DTM racer, who was returning to Formula 3 for a crack at Macau glory. “I tried to pass him but I had to back off for yellow lights,” he explained.
Somehow, those yellow lights between the Mandarin kink and Lisboa had been left on, even though the race was now green. Some backed off and braked earlier than usual, including 15th-placed Jehan Daruvala, who had Florsch tucked into his slipstream. Florsch had no time to avoid the Carlin machine and, according to the following Guan Yu Zhou, she hit Daruvala’s right-rear wheel. She spun around, the left-side wheels torn loose, and entered Lisboa out of control at a crazy velocity – she’d been travelling at 276km/h (171mph) in the speed trap just before the braking area. Japanese F3 champion Tsuboi was minding his own business as she smashed into the TOM’S machine, and the impact launched the Van Amersfoort Racing Dallara over its rollhoop and into the sky. Florsch cleared the barrier, clipped the top of the fence, and her flight was only halted by the photographers’ bunker, before the car crashed down.
Florsch sustained a spinal fracture,
Tsuboi had hospital attention to his back, while two photographers and one marshal also suffered injuries – but by a freak set of circumstances it was a whole lot less serious than it could have been. “We have to thank the angels she had with her today, and for the fantastic strength of the Dallara car,” said shaken team boss Frits van Amersfoort.
The F3 crowd is a close-knit bunch, and news was soon filtering through from photographers at the scene that Florsch was moving in the car – an enormous relief. A lengthy delay was caused by repair work on the fence, and then Ticktum did his stuff. It was an expression of joy in driving his perfect car around this perfect race track, a stretch of asphalt unmatched anywhere in the world. His qualifying effort had been superb, unleashing two awesome laps at the end of the session that finally broke Marcus Ericsson’s long-standing qualifying lap record from 2009. Other drivers – notably Eriksson, Callum Ilott, Juri Vips and Jake Hughes – probably would have got very close without the usual Macau litany of yellow flags and crashes ruining their hot laps, and many predicted that Eriksson, once he got up to second place, would be tough for Ticktum to keep behind.
The Swede managed that when the race finally went green, once again catching Fenestraz’s tow and just about squeezing down the inside with a late-braking effort at Lisboa. Now the chase was on, but Ticktum was keeping Eriksson at arm’s length when Enaam Ahmed found his third different location of the weekend at which to crash, thumping the wall at Moorish. That’s a
tough place for the efficient Macau marshals and their cranes to recover a car from, and once again the safety car was called out.
The race went green with four laps to go.
Yet again, Ticktum not only made a fantastic restart but also carried awesome pace through Fishermen’s Bend and R Bend so that he held a 0.721-second advantage over Eriksson as they crossed the start/ finish line. Eriksson was able to draft Ticktum, but only to the extent of pulling alongside to the left as they entered the braking area for the right-handed Lisboa. Ticktum held the advantageous line, then blitzed the rest of the lap to be 1.028s in front with three tours remaining. He then extended that to 1.513s, and 1.550s with one to go. Eriksson simply had no answer.
“I was not really on it at the restarts,” admitted Eriksson. “I lost a few metres and that was the saving moment for Dan. It was super work for Dan, super work for the team, and I’m just happy that Motopark had a one-two.”
“We’ve seen that Dan really deserves this weekend,” said Motopark boss Timo Rumpfkeil, his team celebrating Macau glory for the second year in succession. “I can’t remember someone topping both qualifying sessions and winning both races. We had 35 people working their asses off this weekend, so we had a chat with Dan and Joel before the race, but they know how to race each other and I have to say I was pretty chilled – surprisingly.” He then added, tongue-incheek: “I was more nervous to see Callum around because we’ve had incidents with him in the past!”
Ilott wasn’t around for long though.
He’d been a force all weekend on his return from GP3 with Carlin, and sat on the front row for the qualification race. His final
qualifying lap looked like a Ticktum challenger, only for Marino Sato to crash in front of him at the narrow Police bend – Ilott’s avoidance was incredible, illustrating his remarkable reflexes.
He got into Ticktum’s slipstream and swept around the outside at the Mandarin kink to take the lead at the start of the Saturday race. Ticktum challenged again, and Ilott had to brake as late as he dared at Lisboa to stay ahead, the left-rear flicking out and almost kissing the barrier. “I used Dan as a reference for my braking because I know he’s quite good on the brakes,” grinned Ilott, “but I wasn’t stopping! I went down the gears, went down one more and it nearly bumped the wall. It was a bit lucky.”
Ticktum got back ahead around the outside into Lisboa on lap two, and within half a lap both knew that Ticktum had a pace advantage. Ilott later dropped behind Eriksson in a pass in which Eriksson scuffed the wall on the approach to Lisboa, and he nearly lost third place too to Fenestraz, while Ticktum’s only real worry in that race was a stray dog on the racing line at Dona Maria. He gave the dog a wide berth, and the safety car was called out while the marshals retrieved it.
Ilott didn’t make the greatest of starts to the Grand Prix the following day, but it looked as though the slipstream would save him until he found himself on the wrong side of the track into Lisboa, and he slipped to fifth. It was a similar story after the stoppage, and Ilott eventually crossed the line eighth, although he was promoted one position when Vips – who had passed him on the final lap – was penalised 40 seconds after the race for overtaking under the red flag. “I didn’t have the pace – the car felt all right but it wasn’t perfect,” he said. “I was just in the wrong position and the guys behind were a lot quicker where I wasn’t, which was down the straights.”
Fenestraz upheld Carlin honour superbly,
after a generally unimpressive season in the F3 European Championship. In typical Fenestraz style, his hands were a blur of activity on the steering wheel on the mountain section, and he even challenged Ticktum for the lead at the start of the final, getting ultra-close to the barrier as the cars approached Lisboa. “It was going to be hard to beat Dan,” he admitted. “I had an advantage with the new tyres [Fenestraz and Ilott had four fresh Yokohamas remaining for the race, while most of the other top runners had two], but with the red flags you cannot take the most out of it.”
While Ilott faded, another Brit from the GP3 ranks had a superb Macau GP. Jake Hughes has had a sorry season for various reasons, but looked terrific on track with his Hitech GP car. His pace on the mountain was so impressive in Friday free practice that some erroneously thought he had new tyres on, and he was another to have genuine Ticktum-matching pace in qualifying only to be scuppered by yellow flags. His form in the races was solid rather than spectacular, but fourth position – and best Mercedes-engined runner behind the Volkswagen-powered top three – was a great achievement.
Hitech, of course, stays in F3 in the new FIA championship next season; Motopark’s F3 activities are confined to the existing cars in the Dtm-aligned series after it disgracefully wasn’t accepted for the sparkly new Formula 1-supporting show. “It’s an emotional way for us to say goodbye to F3,” said a teary-eyed Rumpfkeil, whose cars sported logos paying tribute to the late former Macau GP coordinator Barry Bland. If the new F3 cars race in Macau next year, there will be a hollow victory, because no team has a better car around these streets than the squad that will not be there.