Mari Boya’s Barcelona race weekend in his words

25 June 2024

It was a home race weekend to remember for Mari Boya, as the Campos Racing driver enjoyed the support of a partisan crowd en route to his maiden FIA Formula 3 race victory.

From the lows of a Practice crash to the highs of the top step on the podium, Boya talks us through his Barcelona race weekend session by session.

PRACTICE – P30

“It’s been quite an intense weekend, started off in Free Practice with no laps, had a brake failure so nothing the team could do to avoid it. Into Turn 1 I totally lost them and couldn’t stop from going into the wall.

“I lost a lot of confidence as a result going into Qualifying.”

A lack of running put Boya on the back foot heading into Qualifying but he managed a top 10 result

QUALIFYING – P10

“But in that session, I had a different feeling on the pedals, so my first lap was quite far from the limit. We looked at the data and immediately on the second set we were P2, six-thousandths from the top, so we got that confidence back going onto the final set.

“We know how tricky Barcelona is to manage the tyres on the outlap but also deal with the traffic. We couldn’t improve much, just a few hundredths. There were a few corners where it was much better but because the start of the lap wasn’t much better because of the traffic, I qualified P10.”

SPRINT RACE – P1

“Starting from P3 in the Sprint Race but we won. We had good pace, managed well throughout the whole race in terms of tyre deg. So super happy with the win. The feeling yesterday was just insane, especially for the team, winning at home was just beautiful.

“It’s an amazing feeling. To be honest, I’ve been dreaming of that moment for a long time. It was just unbelievable, seeing all of the team stood below the podium, they needed this win as much as I did. It’s been a bit of a tricky season so far, so I hope that it can make a difference going forwards.”

After winning the Sprint, Boya finished in the points in the Feature until a post-race penalty demoted him

FEATURE RACE – P14

“The Feature Race – I think we had really good pace. I was managing the tyres a lot and in the end I could take advantage of it. I was quite unlucky at the start with contact that I couldn’t avoid. After that, I lost two positions into Turn 1 and it was hard to recover.

“I finished P8 but got a penalty for track limits, I didn’t know about it in the race so it was impossible for me to change my driving or my lines as I didn’t know. But that’s racing and we move onto Austria. It’s a track that I know and like and I’m looking for more wins. That’s what we need to do.”

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“For sure we can win in Austria. We’ve shown that the car can be good everywhere we go. All I need is a clean weekend where things go our way, no issues, no stress for myself and 100% we can be in the top positions.

“The track can make the racing very interesting. There are three DRS zones which makes it easier to follow the cars ahead and hard to pull away from the rest if you’re at the front. Also with the Soft compound tyres, tyre deg will be a big limiting factor, so we’ll see. We’ll deal with it as best we can.”