Maloney hopeful straightforward Spa return can spark Rodin Carlin upturn

Describing July’s run of three rounds so far as a “difficult” month, Zane Maloney is determined that he and Rodin Carlin can get on top of their Qualifying performance woes and enter the summer break on a high at Spa-Francorchamps.

Whilst the Bajan driver revelled in the high of a podium in the Silverstone Feature Race, the result is dampened by the fact that it was his only points-scoring finish in four rounds back to Barcelona.

Reflecting on a rocky run of results, Maloney believes that the problems with his one lap pace left him unable to capitalise on circumstances elsewhere in the races, given the amount of ground he needed to make up from the get-go.

“Silverstone was great with the P2 in the Feature Race. It was a great race with great pace and generally, the weekend went smoothly and well. Then in Budapest, we struggled for pace on Friday, especially in Qualifying. Once you do Qualifying, the weekend’s kind of set after that, if you’re too far back then it’s difficult to make progress.

“We just need to work on Qualifying, we know why we were slow in Budapest, so it’s just about rectifying it. Things change each weekend, so hopefully we’re on the right end of the grid this weekend.”

Round 11 sees Maloney revisit a happy hunting ground at the Belgian circuit. Last year, he kickstarted a heroic fightback in Formula 3 with the first of three consecutive Feature Race victories after crashing out of Saturday’s Sprint Race, throwing himself into title contention along the way.

Sitting P10 in the Championship this time around and with four rounds to go, the Red Bull junior is realistic that he can’t rejuvenate his season in quite the same way this time around. Still, he is hungry for the opportunity to progress further up into the top 10 with a run of consistent results.

“We were able to win the Feature Race last year and then it started a run of form for the rest of the year. I don’t think it’s that simple, but for sure I love it here and I’ve always gone well here. I’ve been here twice and every time I’ve been on the podium. We just need to work hard as a team and focus on Qualifying, getting it put together. Then, if we put it together, I’m sure we’ll be close to the front and can fight in both races from there.

He added: “We’ve had very good moments this year, but the bad ones are quite bad. So, we just need to be a bit more consistent and a bit closer to the front every weekend. I’ve had three podiums this year in the Feature Races, which are your top three of the weekend overall and that’s great. But the P18s have been not good enough, so we need to focus on getting that higher and consistently being in the points.

“There are only four rounds left, so pretty much the whole season is done. Still time to do something though and I think the main thing now is just to enjoy it, get great results and not really focus on the Championship. In F3 last year I was able to fight back, but it’s a bit far this time.”

The Belgian circuit provides a true test of all the drivers have learnt so far this season. Featuring 102.2m of elevation change, the most of any circuit on the 2023 calendar, Maloney says it will be a major setup balancing act.

The chance of downpours also loom large over every session, with only Sunday’s Feature Race forecast to be rain-free for the moment. With wet-to-dry running making the races more unpredictable, Maloney says adapting to the ever-changing conditions is a task he’s relishing taking on.

“It’s very difficult. Spa is the longest circuit of the year with a lot of high-speed corners, but we’re running low downforce. It’s always difficult to put a lap together and it’s easy over 7km to make many mistakes, especially in the wet. It’s going to be tricky and we need to try to find the right compromise between being quick in Sectors 1 and 3 or Sector 2, but the team know what they’re doing. They’ve already studied all that and we’ll see what the plan is when Practice comes and then over to Qualifying.

He added: “That’s our job as drivers to be quick in any conditions. I love it in the wet, so I hope it’s not too wet where there’s aquaplaning and it’s difficult to see. If it’s like how it is now and drizzling, then it’s good fun and we push the car to the limit. Then if it’s dry going into the Feature Race, it just makes everything an unknown and makes it a lot more exciting because you don’t know who’s going to be fast, you don’t know what the strategy is going to be.

“But to get rid of all the extra excitement, we just need to qualify at the front and then it all becomes a bit simpler. That’s the plan – qualify at the front or close to the front and then just have a clean weekend, no big crazy things and hopefully come away with some great results.”