MRF Round 3 in Dubai, a great end to 2015.

Round 3, MRF Challenge 2015 at Dubai

From never driving the Dubai circuit before and only being able to look at videos on youtube, Laura did amazingly when she went out for the first practise of two, setting a time to put her 11th overall which was a great start to the weekend. “The car felt good and I really liked the circuit, was quick to learn and get in a rhythm”.
With a little tyre problem in practise session two, Laura then dropped back to 14th overall but she wasn’t phased by this back step and was set for qualifying the next morning.

Qually came around the next morning and Laura went out in the car confident to set a time to put her in the top ten. Unfortunately Laura was unlucky to have been issued an uneven batch of tyres which wasn’t determined until on circuit. With a car sliding around for most of the 30min qualifying Laura was struggling to set a time. “The car was sliding around and was so hard to control, it was like I was driving on ice”. With the problem obvious to her team, they brought Laura in with 3 minutes left on the clock to change the tyres used in the practise session, just to see if this was the problem and if it would resolve it. Within half a lap and without even getting much heat into the tyres, Laura was already up half a second so it was obvious that this was the reason for the massive time loss and sliding car. Unfortunately it was too late to set a time and the session was red flagged due to another incident on circuit, giving Laura an overall position of 16th. “I wasn’t happy with the result in qually but there isn’t anything I could have done about the situation”.

Starting at the back for races one and three, Laura had a lot of work to do to come back through the grid and with off line being so dusty, it wasn’t going to be easy.
In races one and two, Laura’s starts were brilliant which got her up to 12th but she struggled to come through any more as the gap had become too big, and with her times being the same as those in front, it was hard to pull the gap back in.

Race three was a difficult race for the whole grid. Laura made a place at the start and then a big crash involving another driver hitting the wall, caused a safety car. This meant the whole grid including Laura drove 5 laps under the safety car. When it was clear and the green flag was shown, Laura had an amazing restart making four places but unfortunately the red flag was shown due to another crash, and taking the results from the lap previous meant that Laura finished 14th and not 10th.

Starting her last race 14th, Laura was determined to get her result she had deserved all weekend.
Laura had yet another brilliant start getting her 3 places and moving her to 11th. Throughout the race, Laura’s times kept improving and she picked off drivers one by one as they made mistakes, she was driving consistently, this helped her to get through to 6th place when crossing the line giving her her best result to date in the championship.