Kiwi driver Ronan Murphy is heading back to NZ for a few weeks having competed in the latest F4 US Championship round at the Barber Motorsport Park, Birmingham, Alabama. Here he gives us his thoughts on the weekend…..
Not the best of weekends at Round 3 of the F4 US Championship at Barber Motorsport Park in Alabama. Qualifying was unfortunately cancelled due to a thunderstorm which meant I had to start down in 19th for race 1 as grid positions were based on previous overall championship placings.
I ended up finishing race 1 in 12th. I then started 21st for race 2 and made 11 spots on my way up to 10th.
Grid positions are set from your fastest lap times in the previous race and obviously when you start back in the field it’s hard to get the clean air to set a quick lap time.
I took a gamble in race 3 and pitted to try and get clean air so as to set a fast race lap in order to start further up the grid for race 4 but this unfortunately didn’t pay off (too many laps under yellow flag) and I started 15th.
The final race was our first full green race of the season and unfortunately we just got it wrong with the set up. The car was really good at the beginning of the race but after getting held up for a few laps by a couple of cars ahead, my tyres went off very quickly once I got past, and I struggled badly for grip in the last half of the race. I ended up falling back by quite a bit and ended up finishing in a disappointing 14th.
Although overall it was not the weekend I had hoped for, due to some things out of our control such as qualifying, it was still an awesome experience being able to drive at such an amazing track.
I will be returning back home to New Zealand in two days before going into quarantine for two weeks, and then returning home to Hawkes Bay for a few weeks.
I will be working hard over that time to find the rest of the funding needed to finish off the season, and to make sure I am as fit and prepared as possible for the start of the second half of the Championship at Sebring International Raceway, in Florida at the end of September followed by round 5 at Homestead Miami also in Florida and the final round at Circuit of Americas in Austin Texas late in October.
Although I haven’t yet enjoyed the outright success that I was hoping for (and expecting) I have nevertheless experienced a couple of podiums and hard fought placings since being here, possibly passed as many or more cars on track as any other competitor season to date and learnt a tremendous amount in regards to how to prepare and race at this level and in particular how to manage in the big fields of up to 33 F4 cars in the class.
Thank you all so much for your support to this date, especially to those who have contributed towards making my F4 dream a reality racing to this point as it means so much to me.
I am really looking forward to coming home and hopefully catching up with most of you at some point over the next few weeks and working on my plans moving forward.
If any of you would like to catch up to discuss or assist in the next half of my season here in America please drop me a note back or contact me on my NZ number ( +64 27 341 6659) on my return, or feel free to call Kevin ( +64 27 411 6889) and we’ll arrange a time to meet up and have a chat.
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