Despite the torrid weather in Barcelona, fresh winds blew in the Euroformula Open in today’s free practice sessions: in his first appearance in the series, Theo Micouris, at the wheel of the Nielsen Racing #7 Dallara, was the fastest man on track. His best lap time (1.42.824), posted in the morning session, could not be beaten.
It was a true surprise, as the 20-year-old British-Cypriot has virtually no experience with single-seaters. He races in LMP3 in the Michelin Le Mans Cup and has won, in recent years, the title in the Ligier European Series and the Radical SR1 Cup. With a good sense of understatement, Theo declared: “Except for one event in GB3 two years ago, I have never raced formulas. I prepared for this event testing for three days with the car, which requires some adaptation, but it’s coming along.”
Second-fastest was championship leader Tymek Kucharczyk (BVM), beaten by 0s195, while Motopark’s Joss Garfias was third (+0s218) and posted the best time of the afternoon session (1.32.824).
Yevan David (Motopark) was fourth (+0s259) ahead of teammates Everett Stack (+0s486), the fastest in Thursday’s private test, and Rubens Barrichello (+0s664) and the other debuting driver, and BVM’s pair composed by Enzo Yeh (+0s740) , the other driver debuting here, and Alessandro Famularo (+0s812).
It was a more difficult day for other front-runners, such as Michael Shin, Ed Pearson and Diego de la Torre, who all hit trouble, and ended at the bottom of the time sheets.