F3 Monaco: Marti dominates sprint for second win of 2023

The Campos Racing driver started on reverse-grid pole for Saturday’s race as the series made its first visit to the principality since its GP3 guise in 2012.

Despite one safety car, it was a sedate race for F3, with few moves among the top 10.

After the restart, Marti managed to build a convincing gap, having opened up three seconds to Leonardo Fornaroli in the first 11 laps of racing before crossing the line eight seconds ahead of the Trident driver.

Gregoire Saucy finished third for ART Grand Prix to take his third podium of the season, sitting second in the drivers’ standings.

With Marti leading off the line ahead of Fornaroli, the only early move at the front came courtesy of Saucy passing Jenzer’s Taylor Barnard for third around the outside of Turn 1.

Further back, Hitech driver Luke Browning made it past Caio Collet (MP) and Sunday polesitter Gabriele Mini clinched 11th from Prema rival Dino Beganovic.

Josep Maria Marti, Leonardo Fornaroli and Gregoire Saucy (Photo by: Formula Motorsport Ltd)

The safety car was quickly deployed after MP Motorsport driver Jonny Edgar found the wall at Turn 1, ending his race, with team-mate Mari Boya swerving to avoid him and suffering terminal damage to his rear-left side.

Racing resumed on lap six, with Franco Colapinto also making it past Barnard, this time up the inside of the Fairmont hairpin.

Tommy Smith was involved in a shunt heading into the tunnel in his Van Amersfoort Racing car, with Oliver Goethe bumping him into the wall and receiving a 10-second penalty.

Smith was also involved in a tussle between Piotr Wisnicki and Ido Cohen at the hairpin as the trio battled further down the field, the Israeli driver nudging the Pole as they headed down the hill.

By lap 15, the gap from Marti to Fornaroli was two seconds, and it continued to grow, up to three seconds just two laps later as the Spaniard pulled away and Fornaroli fell into Saucy’s clutches.

Further back, Sebastian Montoya (Hitech) looked set to close on Trident driver Gabriel Bortoleto, but the Brazilian was able to hold him behind in the fight for sixth.

Saucy had a small lock-up into the hairpin on lap 21 as he attempted to close further on Fornaroli, but never made it close enough.

Colapinto finished fourth with Barnard and Bortoleto in fifth and sixth. Montoya, Browning, Collet and Prema driver Paul Aron rounded off the top 10.

F3 Monaco Race Results (23 laps)

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Points
1	Pepe Martí	Campos Racing	35'47.957		10
2	Leonardo Fornaroli	Trident	35'56.080	8.123	9
3	Gregoire Saucy	ART Grand Prix	35'56.792	8.835	8
4	Franco Colapinto	MP Motorsport	35'57.281	9.324	7
5	Taylor Barnard	Jenzer Motorsport	35'59.546	11.589	6
6	Gabriel Bortoleto	Trident	36'01.603	13.646	5
7	Sebastian Montoya	Hitech Pulse-Eight	36'01.903	13.946	4
8	Luke Browning	Hitech Pulse-Eight	36'02.536	14.579	3
9	Caio Collet	Van Amersfoort Racing	36'03.942	15.985	2
10	Paul Aron	Prema Powerteam	36'05.872	17.915	1
11	Gabriele Minì	Hitech Pulse-Eight	36'06.396	18.439
12	Dino Beganovic	Prema Powerteam	36'07.956	19.999
13	Zak O'Sullivan	Prema Powerteam	36'08.896	20.939
14	Nikola Tsolov	ART Grand Prix	36'10.248	22.291
15	Nikita Bedrin	Jenzer Motorsport	36'11.215	23.258
16	Rafael Villagomez	Van Amersfoort Racing	36'11.985	24.028
17	Oliver Goethe	Trident	36'23.803	35.846
18	Piotr Wiśnicki	PHM Racing by Charouz	36'26.424	38.467
19	Ido Cohen	Rodin Carlin	36'28.326	40.369
20	Christian Mansell	Campos Racing	36'28.769	40.812
21	Tommy Smith	Van Amersfoort Racing	36'30.354	42.397
22	Oliver Gray	Rodin Carlin	36'31.677	43.720
23	Sophia Flörsch	PHM Racing by Charouz	36'33.102	45.145
24	Kaylen Frederick	ART Grand Prix	36'35.350	47.393
25	Hugh Barter	Campos Racing	36'38.033	50.076
26	Alex Garcia	Jenzer Motorsport	36'49.350	1'01.393
27	Hunter Yeany	Rodin Carlin	36'54.550	3 Laps
	Roberto Faria	PHM Racing by Charouz	3 laps
	Mari Boya	MP Motorsport	3 laps
	Jonny Edgar	MP Motorsport	4 laps
View full results