Daizun Download: FREC Paul Ricard - Round 6
2026 FIA Formula Regional European Championship Race Report - Circuit Paul Ricard, France - Round 6
Credit: © Dutch Photo Agency
Round 6 took us to the south of France and Circuit Paul Ricard - a track with a history stretching back to 1970 and a layout that demands respect. The Mistral Straight is one of the longest in European single-seater racing, the chicanes are unforgiving, and the heat in Provence doesn't let up. At 35°C, this was as much a test of endurance as it was of outright pace.
Credit: © Dutch Photo Agency
Qualifying 1
Paul Ricard greeted us with sweltering 32°C heat, and the track was unforgiving from the off. Running in Group B, I finished eighth in the group - a session where the margins at the front were razor thin, with just 0.008 seconds separating pole-sitter Kean Nakamura-Berta from Sebastian Wheldon on the front row. After my success at Hungaroring, I was hoping for a higher result, but in a field this tight, every tenth matters.
Credit: © Dutch Photo Agency
Race 1
Starting from P16, the opening lap was scrappy - I dropped back to seventeenth, then eighteenth as the field jostled for position. But I kept my head and by lap two I was back up to sixteenth, and the charge was on.
The Mistral Straight is a weapon at this circuit and I used it. The slipstream is powerful around Paul Ricard and with twenty-three minutes on the clock I'd worked my way up to fifteenth, and when Hanna spun I moved into fourteenth behind Anurag. I kept pushing, getting ahead of Saeter in the process to claim 13th.
The mid-pack battle was relentless - positions changing corner to corner, wheel to wheel with no margin for error. With nineteen minutes on the clock I dropped back to seventeenth behind Popov as the scrapping continued, and that's the nature of racing in this field. Every position is hard won and easily lost. I kept pushing to the end, focusing on consistency. On the penultimate lap I got past Costa to cross the line in sixteenth. Not the result I came for, but a race where I gave everything I had in extremely competitive conditions.
Credit: © Dutch Photo Agency
Qualifying 2
A competitive session that went down to the wire. Running in the first group, I qualified eleventh within my group as the session was ultimately decided by the second group in the closing moments. Emanuele Olivieri pipped Sebastian Wheldon to pole with a late lap of 1:57.350 - just 0.079 seconds splitting the two at the top. Championship leader Nakamura-Berta qualified third, setting up an intriguing front row for Race 2.
Credit: © Dutch Photo Agency
Race 2
Starting from P22, I was immediately on the move - up to twentieth by the end of lap one. But the opening lap brought drama before we’d barely got going. Kostić and Daryanani came through the chicane and Kostić lost a rear left tyre, bringing out the safety car almost immediately. I was running P20 while the car was recovered, and used the restart to claim nineteenth as the field went back to green.
From there it was the usual Paul Ricard midfield battle - intense, unforgiving, and decided by inches. With fifteen minutes on the clock I got past Dupé to move into eighteenth and set my sights on Macedo ahead. After a tussle with Saeter, he ended up on the slip road and I clipped the cones at the chicane, which drew the attention of race control and disrupted the rhythm I’d been building. I was in the mix throughout, making up eight places across the race, bringing the car home in fourteenth, the most progress seen across the grid.
At the front, Sebastian Wheldon was dominant - controlling the race to take his third win of the season, with Olivieri second and Abkhazava completing the podium. The title fight remains incredibly tight heading into the summer break, with everything still to play for when the series resumes at Imola in September.
Time to reset, recharge during the break, and come back stronger.
