The opening round of the Formula Renault (FR) 2.0 Eurocup was at the former F1 track at Zolder in Belgium this weekend, where Jon was making his European FR debut for the SG Drivers Project Team.
The engine that Jon is racing this year is actually derived from the 16-valve, two-litre Renault Clio Sport, which is a sealed unit when delivered. It is based on the road-going F4R engine, which is very similar to the road car production version. The main modification for the Formula Renault single-seater, is the use of a semi-dry sump to avoid oil starvation in the longer corners. The air intake, off set cam timing, and specific electronic management, guarantee a far superior performance to the mainstream production unit.
The engine is mated to a six-speed sequential gearbox, and within the regulations, the drivers can chose from three sets of ratios, short, medium, and long. The shock absorbers are longitudinally mounted and pushrod-actuated, with a mono-shock absorber being used at the front, with twin-shock absorbers at the rear.
The Formula Renault single-seater is carbon-fibre monocoque chassis made by Taatus, and fully complies with “1999 FIA F3” standards. The nose cone, made of a deformable crash structure to absorb front impacts, also complies with “2008 FIA F3” standards.
New body is available for this year’s 2007 Eurocup rounds, inspired by its "big sister", the World Series Formula Renault 3.5 litre formula. Apart from the rear wing and the engine hood, everything is new, from the nose cone and front wing, ‘barge boards’, side-pods with integrated chimneys to expel hot air, ‘tyre ramps’, under-tray, diffuser, and rear spoiler fins.
Although improving the performance was not the purpose of this change, this is only the second major aerodynamic change since 2004, although the changes have helped to make the car more stable through the faster corners, owing to the greater efficiency of the new front wing.
During testing leading up to the opening race weekend the pace was so close that in the first 20 cars alone, 7/10ths was enough to separate the fastest driver overall, from those further back in the pack. Despite his ‘rookie’ tag Jon was showing extremely quick pace in testing, which bode well for the race weekend in Belgium.
Sadly for Jon his qualifying session was a case of pure bad luck. One of the first cars ready to go out onto he track, he had no sooner dropped the clutch and made his way down the pit-lane, when the red flag was shown. This meant that Jon had to make a slow lap of the circuit back to the pits. He then had little choice but to line-up at the back of a very long queue of cars, which compromised his qualifying efforts, as he was then unable to find a clear lap in the short period of time left for him to do so.
Although there had been problems with the car on the Thursday before the race, when Jon had been experiencing massive understeer, a slight improvement was found on the Friday, before further changes were made prior to the Saturday qualifying session. It meant that Jon went into the aborted session with a completely untested car, so to drive as well as he did in the circumstances was a major achievement for his maiden Eurocup FR outing
“We had some problems before qualifying,” Jon explained, “but we worked on these to dial them out, so that we were ready for the race. I was hoping to make an impression in the first race, but there is not much that you can do when you are minding your own business, and somebody wipes the right front corner off your car!”
It left Jon with a DNF from Race 1, although he made up for it in Race 2 on Sunday, once the damage had been repaired from the previous day. “Jon made an unbelievable start,” one team observer commented after the race, “and he made up around half a dozen places on that first lap. His lap times were impressive, and he was certainly recording a series of laps that were more than a match for the leading drivers.”
It was unfortunate that Jon had been rammed by another competitor in the first round, but by the second race, it was evident that he had the bit between his teeth, and gave warning of the force his rivals will have to beat once the next round in Germany arrives.
Jon and the SG Formula Team now have a couple of weeks to sort the car out, before Rounds 3 and 4 at the Nurburgring in Germany, although “we also have two rounds of the French Championship coming up in the next few weeks anyway, so we have a busy time ahead,” he added.
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