Alguersuari tops official Croft test

The 18-year-old Spaniard took two pole positions and a victory on his series debut at Oulton Park last month, and is hoping to add to his tally at Croft on April 27.

"I was very happy that we were able to be so quick, especially because it's the first time I've been to the circuit," he told autosport.com. "I had a good feeling very quickly on the first morning and we found a great set-up for cold tyres in the afternoon.

"You can't take too much from testing times, but we did some good work on the car, which is very important, and I now have a lot of confidence for going back to race there in two weeks."

Alguersuari edged out his Carlin Motorsport teammate Oliver Turvey by just half a tenth on Wednesday and then lowered his time to a 1:12.696 on Thursday morning - six tenths of a second quicker than last year's pole time at the North Yorkshire circuit.

Atte Mustonen (Raikkonen Robertson) and the Mygales of Esteban Guerrieri (Ultimate Motorsport) and Nick Tandy (JTR) made significant improvements on the final afternoon of the test to finish up second, third, and fourth quickest respectively.

Fortec Motorsport's Marcus Ericsson finished the test fifth overall, after topping the first session on Wednesday morning.

Austrian Philipp Eng was sixth fastest, making his first British F3 appearance for Hitech Racing in place of Max Chilton who was unavailable for the test.

Eng, who won last year's Formula BMW World Final, is hoping to be able to make selected appearances for the team this year, around his German F3 Cup commitments.

Carlin's Brendon Hartley, who drove Scuderia Toro Rosso's new STR3 at Vairano in Italy last week, finished the test seventh overall.

The other new face in the 27-car field was former FBMW race winner Oliver Oakes, who sampled a National Class Team Loctite because the team's regular driver Niall Quinn couldn't make the test.

Oakes, who is hoping to join the series this season in his own car, told autosport.com: "It was a good experience to get some mileage in an F3 car, and now I'm looking forward to getting my into my own car."

Combined times:

Pos Driver               Team                   Car         Time  
 1. Jaime Alguersuari    Carlin Motorsport      D/M     1:12.696
 2. Atte Mustonen        Raikkonen Robertson    D/M     1:12.977
 3. Esteban Guerrieri    Ultimate Motorsport    M/M     1:13.149
 4. Nick Tandy           JTR                    M/M     1:13.192
 5. Marcus Ericsson      Fortec Motorsport      D/M     1:13.197
 6. Philipp Eng          Hitech Racing          D/M     1:13.247
 7. Brendon Hartley      Carlin Motorsport      D/M     1:13.268
 8. John Martin          Raikkonen Roberston    D/M     1:13.276
 9. Sebastian Hohenthal  Fortec Motorsport      D/M     1:13.282
10. Michael Devaney      Ultimate Motorsport    M/M     1:13.317
11. Sam Abay             Carlin Motorsport      D/M     1:13.356
12. Sergio Perez         T-Sport                D/M     1:13.405
13. Henry Arundel        Raikkonen Robertson    D/M     1:13.455
14. Alistair Jackson     Raikkonen Robertson    D/M     1:13.494
15. Hywel Lloyd          CF Racing (N)          D/H     1:13.658
16. Walter Grubmuller    Hitech Racing          D/M     1:13.705
17. Oliver Turvey        Carlin Motorsport      D/M     1:13.752
18. Philip Major         Fortec Motorsport      D/M     1:13.984
19. Ricardo Teixeira     Ultimate Motorsport    M/M     1:14.012
20. Salman Al-Khalifa    T-Sport (N)            D/H     1:14.191
21. Andy Meyrick         Carlin Motorport (N)   D/H     1:14.219
22. Jay Bridger          Fluid Motorsport (N)   D/H     1:14.338
23. Steven Guerrero      T-Sport (N)            D/H     1:14.634
24. Kristjan Einar       Carlin Motorsport (N)  D/H     1:14.665
25. Stefan Wilson        Fluid Motorsport (N)   D/H     1:15.596
26. Oliver Oakes         Team Loctite (N)       D/H     1:15.741
27. Craig Reiff          Nexa Racing (N)        D/H     1:15.786


(D/M = Dallara-Mercedes, M/M = Mygale-Mercedes, D/H = Dallara-Mugen Honda)