Scheckter slowed by mechanical dramas.

Tomas Scheckter saw his podium hopes slip away when he suffered engine problems in the second leg of the Macau F3 Grand Prix.

The Swiss Racing Team driver would nevertheless finish the event as the highest placed driver from the British F3 series, with a sixth place overall, in just his first race with the team.

Scheckter had qualified a disappointing fourteenth, 1.588secs off pole sitter Karthikeyan, on his first visit to the former Portuguese colony, having been slowed at the end of the session.

He explained; "I was fifth or six, when I came in for new tyres. The track was at its quickest in the last few laps, but I got stuck behind a slower car - you can't pass on the tight half of the circuit - and had to slow and drop back to find some space. I was going for it on a really good lap, when I came round a corner and there was the same guy again! It was frustrating and left me further back than I wanted to be."

The first race saw the South African produce a creditable drive - gaining seven places, to finish just 0.655secs ahead of Italian Enrico Toccalelo. "I was able to get past a lot of people at the start of the first race. I went left - right, in and out of them and was ninth at the end of the first lap. The race was stopped after about six laps, and I made two more places off the re-start."

The race one result allowed the Jaguar test driver the chance to feature at the sharp end in the all-important leg two decider, however it was not to be; "In the second race I started to have some engine problems. We were suddenly only 22nd quickest through the speed trap on the straight, despite running a really low wing, and the engine was cutting out at the hairpin. I got up to fifth, but the engine briefly died and I lost a place, and took sixth."

Scheckter maturely refuses to dwell on a missed opportunity, and instead heads to Korea better prepared for the challenge, "It's good to have got a street circuit under my belt, it is very different to what I have raced on before - unbelievable! I feel bad, because we could have done better, but with the engine problem I couldn't pass people on the straight, I had to stay in their slipstream. Korea next weekend is on permanent circuit, and I'm really looking forward to it."