Oct 22, 1995
\nDonington, England \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Valvoline Team USA Formula 3 Scholarship winner Memo Gidley made light of his lack of experience as he battled his way through a high-quality field to an 11th-place finish in today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s International Formula 3 Challenge, run over 20 laps at Donington Park.
\nFrom 16th grid position, Gidley made up three places in the first two laps, and passed fellow F3 debutant Marc Cramer on Lap 10. Memo also enjoyed a dice lasting several laps with a front-runner recovering from an early spin, and fought off a last-lap challenge from another F3 rookie, Germany\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Thomas Schwister.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The opening laps were intense. With everyone running together, it was impossible to get into the kind of smooth rhythm these cars like, and we were all sliding around because the tires weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t up to temperature yet,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Gidley said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I passed Cramer after he got up on the curb exiting the Old Hairpin, which gave me a good run up the hill. He tried to squeeze me out but I had the momentum.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
The race was dominated by drivers with prior F3 experience, and the \u00c2\u00a310,000 winner\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s prize was claimed by 1994 Formula Vauxhall Champion Owen McAuley\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Dallara-Mitsubishi. F3 veterans Jason Elliott and Scott Lakin followed McAuley home, while this year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s French F3 titlist Laurent Redon finished sixth.<\/p>\n
Highest-placed class debutants in seventh and ninth were 1995 Formula Vauxhall Champion Jonny Kane and 1994 Barber-Saab Pro Series star Juan Pablo Montoya. Both were entered by triple British Formula 3 champion team Paul Stewart Racing.<\/p>\n
Gidley\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s West Surrey Racing \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and Valvoline \u00e2\u20ac\u201c teammate Brian Cunningham continued his impressive form by qualifying sixth, but retired on Lap Two after an incident with Spain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Marc Gene.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I notched up a few firsts today,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Gidley. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153This was my first standing start and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m glad it went well because, unlike our rolling starts at home, your start here can make or break your whole race. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never had a visor full of grass before either \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the low wings and chassis make these cars pretty good lawn mowers!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Summing up his Scholarship experience, Gidley said: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve learned so much, but at the same time I realize I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve barely scratched the surface. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been an incredible eye-opener and good preparation for the future, whatever I race. I just want to thank Valvoline and all the supporting sponsors who made it possible.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Gidley\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Team USA Formula 3 Scholarship Dallara F395 also boasted allegiance from Miller Genuine Draft, Honda, TrueChoice, LCI International, Firestone, the North American Touring Car Championship, Flamecrusher, RACER and Automundo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Oct 22, 1995 Donington, England \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Valvoline Team USA Formula 3 Scholarship winner Memo Gidley made light of his lack of experience as he battled his way through a high-quality field to an 11th-place finish…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1655,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1654"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1654"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1654\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1656,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1654\/revisions\/1656"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}