The most iconic event of the Formula Regional European Championship by Alpine 2022 season has come and gone, as last week’s Monaco round marked the second appearance for G4 Racing on the streets of the Principality.
The technical street circuit is a big challenge for drivers, but Axel, Matias, and Owen behaved great with a faultless and spirited drive. As a result, they managed to cross the finish line of Race 2 on Sunday, which took place just a few hours before the start of the prestigious Formula 1 Grand Prix of Monaco.
With 19 cars running on the 3,337 kilometers of the challenging city venue, traffic management turned out to be the most key element in qualifying. Axel, Matias, and Owen performed well in group B. A late red flag interrupted the session with five minutes to go. At the restart, all the cars tried to set a final lap time in the closing stages, creating huge traffic issues which affected the G4 Racing trio.
However, they all managed to qualify for Sunday’s race. Owen was able to gain four places, moving from P23 on the grid to P19 in the end. Matias recovered as well, going from P25 to P21, while Axel was demoted from P21 to P24 at the end of the race. After using the run-off area in turn 1 to avoid a collision, he did not give back the positions.
Adrián Muñoz (Sporting and Technical Manager): “Monaco is more than a race, all the atmosphere around the track, to be alongside the F1, even more with the return of the public on the grandstands, it’s such a privilege. Not many drivers can say they did this race, and it’s a unique experience for everyone. The format is different from the rest of the championship rounds. With just one free practice session, the most important thing was to gain as much mileage as possible, mission accomplished by our drivers. Qualifying is the most important moment of the event, as only the best 20 cars would do both races, and the rest were going to be split between Race 1 on Saturday and Race 2 on Sunday. Unfortunately, all our cars were in Group B, making life very difficult for them. In the end, the red flag came at the worst moment possible for us, and we couldn’t qualify high enough to take part in both races. At least, we classified the 3 cars for Sunday. The race was difficult, as usual at Monaco, as it’s almost impossible to find a place to overtake, but overall the weekend was positive as all the cars crossed the finish line, and the drivers continued to improve and gain experience. There’s no time to breathe as we are already on our way to Paul Ricard, a completely different circuit that everyone knows well from testing”.
Axel Gnos (Driver): “Very glad to be back in Monaco, it’s always a special moment of the year to be back between these walls. We worked hard with the team all through the weekend. I will keep working on myself and improving as I did here. Thanks to everyone for the great job, and to my sponsor Karting Sallent. Big push for Paul Ricard”.
Matías Zagazeta (Driver): “It’s been a very unique experience to drive around Monaco. The track is very difficult for overtaking, but extremely fun to drive. It was my first street circuit race weekend, and I hope to get this opportunity again. We had a very good pace, but I couldn’t maximize it. As always, the team did a fantastic job all weekend and is now fully focused on Paul Ricard”.
Owen Tangavelou (Driver): “I raced for the first time on a street circuit and in Monaco. I am very glad to have been able to drive on this track. The practice session was tricky because there were a lot of red flags and FCY, and it was difficult to put together a clean lap. In qualifying, I had the pace to be in the top-10 and to qualify for the two races but in my fastest lap, I wasn’t able to put it all together. It was a shame for me because I was 28 thousand off the top-10 cut. I enjoyed the race a lot, I did a great start, but on this track, it’s very difficult to overtake, and I hadn’t had the opportunity to make any progress through the field”.