Christian Mansell has enjoyed a productive weekend at Donington Park as he moved up the standings in the British Formula 3 Championship.

 

Having qualified in P9 and P8 for the round's two main races, Mansell made progress in each outing, best summed up by a brilliant move into fifth place on the final lap of the first race.

 

The 16-year-old backed up his race one effort in race two in similar fashion and again he was making up places, eventually finishing sixth place.

 

In a chaotic final reverse race, Mansell finished in sixth place after avoiding all the drama that saw the top three championship contenders all retiring.

 

As a result of those retirements, Mansell managed to pick up some valuable points ahead of the fourth round later this month, moving into fourth place on the outright standings.

 

Compatriot Bart Horsten had less of an enjoyable weekend compared to Mansell.

From an actual pace perspective, the West Australian was sound, picking up a well-deserved P8, before finishing fifth in race two with the fastest lap of the race.

 

However, after causing a collision with Hitech GP teammate Reece Ushijima during their race, a post-race investigation saw Horsten disqualified and handed five-place grid penalty for race three.

 

Undeterred by the penalty, Horsten charged through the field during the final race of the weekend, claiming a race high 10 places to finish the chaotic final race of the weekend in P7.

 

While Horsten didn’t bank as many points as he would have liked, he continued to show plenty of promising signs, slightly moving up the standings to eighth outright.

 

The British Formula 3 Championship’s fourth round of the season takes place at Spa on 23-25 July. 

 

 

Hugh Barter experienced a difficult weekend in Hungary during the third round of the French Formula 4 Championship after mechanical issues and wet weather prevented the youngster from finding pace. 

 

Following a strong practice run where he finished the session as the second fastest car on the road, his car started having issues with the rear dampeners and the 16-year-old struggled through qualifying – grabbing P9 for race one and P14 for race three.

 

When it came to Saturday’s two races, the Victorian again couldn’t find the pace to work his way up the field, finishing the first race in P8 and the reverse grid race in P7.

 

After key changes were made to the car at the conclusion of Saturday, Barter’s confidence grew for the final race and it showed as he climbed up seven places to finish the race in respectable seventh.

 

Although he had a good recovery run on Sunday, Barter’s opening two races saw him drop slightly in the overall championship to third on the outright standings after Macéo Capietto picked up a race win and second place. 

 

The Championship will return to France for the fourth round of the 2021 season, which takes place on 27-29 September.