Wednesday, 16th April 2008

Briton able to continue Australian F3 challenge despite Opes Prime debacle.

James Winslow is to continue his assault on the Australian F3 Championship after inking a deal to join Astuti Motorsport from the third round of the year at Oran Park next weekend.

Winslow will drive Marko Asmer's British F3 championship-winning Shell Racing Solutions Dallara F307 - fresh from a complete rebuild and respray – which was purchased by Astuti Motorsport earlier this season.

Now powered by a Renault engine rather than the Mercedes powerplant that Asmer used in the British series, the team and driver completed a successful first test run at Oran Park on Monday and will aim to continue Winslow's quest for the Australian Drivers Championship together next week. After two rounds Winslow sits second in the championship, less than 10 points behind leader Neil McFadyen.

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Astuti Motorsport also welcomes Ash Samadi to the team and will race the #23 Dallara F304 – Renault in the National Class at Oran Park.

”I'm very pleased to welcome both James and Ash to our team, alongside Ray Chamberlain, for Oran Park and hopefully beyond,” team owner Sam Astuti said. ”James is obviously a very successful driver and we are happy to give him the opportunity to continue his championship challenge with us in the new car. Ash is a very experienced driver and a great guy – I'm looking forward to seeing how he goes and I think he could surprise a few people next week!”

Winslow said the initial run in the car had gone to plan, and he was keen to continue his quest to secure the title.

“I'm very grateful to Sam for helping out and getting us in the car to continue the championship challenge – had he not come along I would've been on a plane back to England right now,” Winslow said. “The car has performed really well - considering it's the first time that the car has run after a complete rebuild - it went very well.

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