Esteban Gutierrez

Barcelona, Spain – Mexican driver Esteban Gutierrez, backed by the talented French team ART Grand Prix, dominated both sessions of the first day of training at the circuit of Catalunya, having recorded a best lap time of 1:37.850 in the 11th lap of the 15 he did this morning. Gutierrez was almost seven tenths faster than Renger Van Der Zander for Mucke, who was second fastest and did 25 laps.

In the afternoon session, interrupted by several red flags brought out by other drivers, Esteban stayed P1 for most of the session, and recorded the best lap time (on lap 42 of 43) of the day with 1:37.480, at an average speed of 171.9 kmh.

The young driver has enjoyed his first visit with the GP3 car to the 4.655 km length track of Catalunya, as he thinks it is more interesting because the car behaves differently here than at Paul Ricard. Gutierrez and the team have been using all the data they gathered from the two previous tests, and have had a very tight schedule which includes working focused on the race set-up of the car.

Although team ART Grand Prix have been fastest in almost every session of the three official tests so far, they keep their feet on the ground, aware that the season has not yet started and there is still a long way to go. The good thing is, Esteban feels ready for his first GP3 race and, as always, they will give their best to continue improving in every aspect and to be consistent day in and day out.

“It was wet in the morning and we had to wait for about two hours until the track was completely dry. This delayed the start of our program but we adapted it the best we could for the rest of the day. Thanks God, we are very happy because despite being the fastest we still were able to improve the car, technically speaking”, Esteban expressed.

“We have to continue working to keep the good pace, we hope tomorrow’s weather conditions will not change as much as today so we can get the best out of the last training before the season begins. It is important to keep our feet on the ground because we know that all the other teams will improve too, and we have to keep up the pace”, he concluded.

Tomorrow’s first session will last three hours and will begin at 9:00 am local time.

For more details on the results, please click here >>

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For more information about Esteban Gutierrez, the ART Grand Prix team, the GP3 Series, or his sponsors Multigama, Telmex, Fastenal, DeAcero, Alpinestars and Bell, visit their official websites at: www.estebanracing.com, www.art-grandprix.com,  www.gp3series.com, www.escuderiatelmex.com, www.fastenal.com, www.deacero.com, www.alpinestars.com, www.bellsports.com.