Manor Motorsport came away from the latest F3 Euroseries meeting at Nogaro in France having displayed a good turn of speed but with little to ultimately show for their efforts in terms of hard results.
Yelmer Buurman emerged as the highest-scoring of Manor's quartet, the 20-year-old's best finish coming with a top-five placing during the opening encounter at the FIA GT Championship-supporting event.
Although the weekend – which saw the Circuit Paul Armagnac host the F3 Euroseries for the first time in the category's history – wasn't Manor's finest hour in terms of results, the pace was undoubtedly there from Buurman and team-mate Franck Mailleux, but the Dinnington-based squad endured more than its fair share of bad luck.
Having qualified fourth for race one, the Dutchman was forced to settle for fifth place after losing out to fellow front-runner Sébastien Buemi at the start. It was a similar story for Mailleux, who ceded a place to Edoardo Mortara early on and was never able to regain it en route to seventh.
For Sunday's race, though, hopes were high of a strong finish for Mailleux on home soil, with the 22-year-old lining up on the front row of the grid. Terrible luck befell the Frenchman at the start, however, when the lights on the gantry failed to illuminate correctly and, seeing Mortara creep on the line, Mailleux went to go before realising he was about to jump the start. Stopping his car in time, it subsequently stalled and he was incredibly fortunate not to be collected by any other drivers.
He would finally get going as the remainder of the grid raced into the distance ahead of him, but was only able to recover to a distant and disappointing 18th spot at the close. The result also meant Mailleux's lead at the top of the rookie standings has been slashed to just two points by nearest rival Mortara with two races left to run.
There was further ill-fortune for Manor as Buurman, who had begun fourth on the grid directly behind his team-mate, just managed to avoid colliding with the stricken Manor car but lost positions in the process. With overtaking at a premium at Nogaro, his race was effectively nullified at the beginning and seventh place when only the top six are eligible to score was a desperately frustrating conclusion to his weekend.
For British ace James Jakes, too, the Nogaro event turned into one he would rather forget, after qualifying a lowly 16th and achieving only an 18th spot in the races, with his Sunday outing curtailed by a driveshaft failure. He has consequently slipped from fourth to fifth in the championship standings.
Lady racer Cyndie Allemann, meanwhile, was the only one of Manor's four drivers to actually gain places during round 17, finishing in 20th position having started 23rd on the grid. On Sunday, the Swiss starlet again produced a good run to climb from 20th position up to 17th place before the demise of Jakes lifted her into the top 16.
