The Red Bull ace v the new Leclerc v the wild outsider title fight
Approaching the halfway stage of the 2018 Formula 3 European Championship no driver has yet emerged as a dominant favourite, as Lando Norris did in 2017. Instead a trio of rookies are sharing the limelight
"Last year you were Landosport; this year you're Ticktumsport."
It's a familiar refrain in Autosport's direction this season in the Formula 3 European Championship paddock, because for the second year running, after Lando Norris's rookie title-winning campaign, there's a Brit running at the front who just can't stop making headlines.
Red Bull junior Dan Ticktum is bludgeoning his way through his rookie F3 season like a comic-book character. Yet he's only fourth in the points, and that's partly because you never know what's going to happen next with the 2017 McLaren Autosport BRDC Award winner...
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Marcus Simmons is the Deputy Editor of Autosport magazine. As a child he was a regular on the chalk banks of Thruxton – hence his unhealthy obsession with 1970s Formula 2 and F3 – before he became an MSA timekeeper at the age of 17. At 19, his reporting debut for Motoring News arguably overshadowed Maradona’s ‘Hand of God’ goal as the sporting moment of June 1986, and he joined the staff in 1990 after graduating from his degree course in Plymouth. A parallel Formula First career – which was as incident-packed as his childhood exploits in show-jumping and hunter trials – finished when he wrote off his car and put himself in hospital in 1991.
Marcus moved to Autosport in the summer of 1996. Since then he has had two stints as a freelancer and a brief spell as editor of Motor Sport magazine, during which the revered green cover was revived, before he rejoined Autosport in 2008. He lives in Teddington with his wife (who, gratifyingly, grew up within earshot of Castle Combe), daughter, stepson, dog, cat and guitars, and additionally has an adult daughter and stepson.
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