Alan van der Merwe heads to Donington Park this weekend [6/7 September] with a very real chance of clinching the British F3 title. The Carlin Motorsport racer needs to score just one third place in the course of rounds 21 and 22 of the British F3 Championship gripped by Avon Tyres to be confirmed as champion.
However, in the Scholarship class the three-way contest seems destined to go down to the wire in the final pair of races at
Brands Hatch in late September. Incredibly, only four points separates Steven Kane, Karun Chandhok and Ernesto Viso, so the Donington races will be full of tension for the Scholarship racers.
If van der Merwe does clinch the crown at
Donington, he will add his name to the impressive list of British F3 champions.
Ayrton Senna, Nelson Piquet, Mika Hakkinen,
Rubens Barrichello, Johnny Herbert, Emerson Fittipaldi and Derek Warwick are just some of the former British F3 champions that have made their mark at the very top of the sport.
A double victory at Spa-Francorchamps last weekend has put van der Merwe a massive 73 points clear of his Carlin Motorsport team mate Jamie Green at the head of the title race. With a maximum of 84 points available through the final four races, it will take a major disaster for van der Merwe not to win the title. However, when the championship season kicked off at Donington back in April, Green was awesome and won both races at his home track.
Green, meanwhile, is now looking favourite for the runner-up slot having pulled out a 47-point margin over Nelson Piquet Junior (Piquet Sport), although the young Brazilian demonstrated front-running pace at Donington back at the start of the season when he made his British F3 debut.
