The Voice of Spalding and South Holland
A painful penalty was part of a weekend to forget in Belgium for Johnathan Hoggard as the British F3 Championship took to the iconic Spa Francorchamps course.
The Fortec Motorsport driver had reduced the gap between him and championship leader Clement Novalak to 28 points with two wins in the previous round at Donington.
But the gap is now back up to 55 points after he could only pick up a seventh, eighth and 13th from rounds 13 to 15 at the weekend.
And Hoggard now has Ayrton Simmons of Chris Dittman Racing breathing down his neck in the championship standings as he picked up a win and a second to move up to third place in the overall standings, 18 points behind the Weston Hills driver.
After qualifying 10th, an eighth was all Hoggard had to show from race one as he was edged by Hampus Ericsson and Ulysse De Pauw while upfront, Kaylen Frederick came out on top of a battle with Simmons.
Hoggard’s Fortec teammate Manuel Maldonado claimed the final podium place ahead of Novalak.
Hoggard actually performed the best of the championship top three in race two, claiming seventh with Novalak 10th and Simmons down in 15th in a race won by maiden victor Nico Varrone.
Simmons romped to the win from pole in the final round of the day finishing 1.8secs ahead of second placed Novalak.
After qualifying ninth Hoggard finished seventh following a battle with Lucas Petterson but in his final lap quest for that place, he was adjudged to have illegally collided with Sasakorn Chaimongkol and was handed a 27 second penalty.
That relegated him below Chaimongkol into 13th position.
There’s just three more weekends of the season left to go with rounds 16 to 18 taking place at Brands Hatch alongside the British GT championship on August 3 and 4.
Formula Three then heads to Silverstone on August 17 and 18 before the season finale at Donington Park on September 14 and 15.
