Dramatic debut for Sandher.

Suk Sandher made his British Formula Three International Championship debut in two dramatic races at Donington Park circuit in the East Midlands, though his first race was rather short, and expensive.

The Indian racer made the worst possible start to his F3 career as the innocent victim in a start line crash in the opening race of the day, before taking his rapidly rebuilt car to fourth in class and his first ever championship points in the series in the second round, despite a persistent misfire in the early laps.

Driving a Mugen-Honda powered Dallara Chassis for the Performance Racing team in the National Class (for older chassis) of the championship, Suk lined up third and fourth on the grid for Sunday's two 20-lap races. As the lights turned green in the first race a car further up the grid stalled, and a fast-starting Suk was unsighted until a rival ahead jinked past the stranded racer at the last minute leaving Suk no time to react before slamming into the rear of the stationery car.

The crack Performance team worked flat out to get Suk back on the grid for the second race of the day, and he finished fourth in class after losing ground in the early laps due to an engine misfire.

"It feels good to finally get a Formula Three race under my belt," explained Suk, after the second race, "but it very nearly didn't happen as we were working on the car right up to when all the other cars were already in the pit lane ready to go out.

"It's hard to trust the car straight away in that situation, especially as the engine immediately started to misfire, but when everything was warmed up the car was fine. When the misfire cleared about halfway through the race our lap times were right there and not far off the quickest times.

"The misfire did the damage to my race - as soon as we got going I could feel it and it is one of those things that as a driver you can do nothing about. I was aiming for two podiums this weekend and ended up with a wrecked car in the first race and a fourth from the second.

"People told me you never get the car away well in your first Formula Three start, but mine was initially very good - it just ended 100 metres later because someone else's was really bad. You know that sort of thing is going to happen at some point; you just don't expect it in your very first race.

At least I know the guys can do a superb job putting rebuilding the car and getting it back out on the grid - they had less than two hours to rebuild a car that was literally a wreck. Unfortunately the damage from the first race has left us with some bills to pay, which makes it that much harder to find the budget to go to Spa for the next meeting."