Styria W Series: Powell tops practice ahead of Visser
Alice Powell topped the timesheets in the first W Series practice session of the season, leading Beitske Visser and Sarah Moore.
The Brit, who finished third in the championship in 2019, finished fastest in her Racing X-sponsored machine with a 1m29.278, set right at the end of the 30-minute session – the only practice of the weekend.
Visser (M Forbes Motorsport), who finished second overall in the inaugural season, had been quickest until she was beaten by Powell by two-tenths in the final minute, with Moore (Scuderia W) in third.
Reigning champion Jamie Chadwick, driving for Veloce Racing, finished in fourth, with Jessica Hawkins (Racing X) in fifth and Bunker Racing’s Fabienne Wohlwend in sixth. In-house team Scuderia W’s Belen Garcia was the highest-placed rookie in seventh.
Rookie Abbie Eaton was first out on track for Ecurie W, also an in-house team, keen to maximise her time in the car with just one practice session before qualifying this afternoon.
Her teammate Emma Kimilainen set an early fast lap of 1m32.912s just five minutes into the session, before improving a few minutes later to a 1m29.867s, which would eventually place her eighth.
Halfway through the session, Chadwick was leading from Powell and Kimilainen, with Visser in fourth.
Moore moved up into third with ten minutes to go, setting a time just five-hundredths behind the leader, before going quickest with a 1m29.538, bumping Chadwick into second and Hawkins into third.
Visser then went quickest with less than five minutes to go, setting a 1m29.427s, before she was pipped to the top spot by Moore on a last-ditch flying lap.
Six cars had lap times deleted for exceeding track limits, an issue also encountered in the earlier Formula 1 first practice session.
W Series’ qualifying will take place at 2.30pm GMT on Friday, before the 30-minute plus one lap race on Saturday afternoon, also at 2.30pm.
This is the series’ first weekend back on track in almost two years, after the 2020 season was cancelled amid the coronavirus pandemic.
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