The team is back from another Italian F4 racing week-end in Austria! The Red Bull Ring, as it often does, showed us the all the challenging and changing conditions it could offer. From light drizzles to heavy rain and the sun rays which would occasionally seep through in between showers. It was a real challenge for both our cars and our team with every session challenging us with different conditions. This week-end was the ultimate test for our drivers’ adaptation skills as well as our engineers’ creativity, as they constantly had to update the setup of the cars to better face the quickly evolving weather and track conditions.

This week-end was also the first race with 2 cars participating for our team, with Argentinian Francisco Soldavini, #54, teaming up with Elia Sperandio, #48. Furthermore, the team was also inaugurating its brand new trailer and truck, as well as our paddock tent. It was amazing to see the team so motivated after the summer break and ready to tackle the new challenges of the second half of the season with a fresh mindset.

For his first ever race week-end in single-seater, Francisco Soldavini showed a good pace all week-end long, making no mistakes throughout the free practice sessions, qualifications and races, despite the hard conditions. We could already notice his attention to detail, his ongoing will to improve and his focused mindset throughout the whole race week-end. He qualified P19 in his group and crosses the line in both of his races, finishing P23 and P24. He was just short to qualify for the final race, but his great potential, his will to learn, and his undeniable skills we are confident that we will get him higher up the grid quickly. We’re very excited to see his evolution during the next couple races!

Elia Sperandio had his best week-end so far in the Italian F4 Championship. His difficult qualification under heavy rain (P20 in his group), was only a minor setback for his races, and allowed the team to improve on his rain set-up for the rest of the week-end. From P25 on the grid of his first race he climbed up to P16 before crossing the checkered flag, although it was during his second race that Elia showed amazing race craft under heavy rain, gaining a staggering 14 positions in only 10 laps due to a long safety car. Starting P26 he finished P12 overall and P8 in the Rookie classification, scoring Rookie points for the second time this year. This qualified him for the final race (P25), which took place on a dry track which he finished P24.

An overall positive week-end for the team considering all the new elements which had to be integrated on a short period of time. We have noted many elements to improve for the final two Italian F4 race week-ends of the year in Monza and Mugello, in October. The learning curve continues, and our motivation and hunger for results keep growing. The chase for points is on!

The Maffi Racing Team
#drivenbyracing