Sep 29, 1995
\nAttleborough, England \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Valvoline Team USA Scholarship winner Memo Gidley began training for his Formula 3 prize race at Donington Park, England, on October 22 with a successful test yesterday at Snetterton.<\/p>\n
The 22-year-old Californian ran five half-hour sessions, totaling over 90 laps in cold but dry conditions. Gidley wheeled West Surrey Racing\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Class B Dallara F394-Mugen Honda to a best lap of 1m 08.1s, equaling the class fastest lap set during a British Formula 3 Championship race at Snetterton three weeks ago.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was impressed,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Dick Bennetts, whose West Surrey Racing team has won five British Formula 3 Championships in the past 15 years. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He did a pretty good job. He didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t go out there and go crazy; he worked away methodically, learned about the car and how it worked and gradually brought his times down. Considering he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d never seen the circuit before, or been in a Formula 3 car, he did very well.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Gidley, who arrived in England in time to attend the previous weekend\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Formula 3 Championship race at Pembrey, thoroughly enjoyed his experience in the car.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153This was the right place for my first time in the car,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Gidley. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Snetterton has a real mix of slow, medium and fast corners, so I got to explore most of the envelope. The car was very different to the Formula Ford 2000 Van Diemen I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been driving this year at home. The F3 car has more power, more grip, more brakes. It feels on a knife-edge all the time. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s true you have to drive it smoothly but you also have to be very decisive with the steering and the throttle to get the most out of it.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The only real problem I had was with my neck. By the end of the day I could hardly hold my head up around the corners. The car\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just got so much grip! I do exercises for that now, but I guess I need to do some more.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Gidley will return to North America this weekend to begin preparations for the final round of the United States Formula Ford 2000 National Championship at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course on October 8. Gidley currently holds a nine-point lead in the standings with three wins to his name. He will then travel back to England for another test at Donington Park prior to the prize-drive race weekend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sep 29, 1995 Attleborough, England \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Valvoline Team USA Scholarship winner Memo Gidley began training for his Formula 3 prize race at Donington Park, England, on October 22 with a successful test yesterday at Snetterton.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1664,"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\/1663"}],"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=1663"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1663\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1665,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1663\/revisions\/1665"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}