Olli continued his impressive run in the Italian F4 Championship with two more rookie podiums at Mugello on his just his second ever meeting in the championship. It was Olli’s first visit to the track and the result means he has been on the rookie podium in five out of six races!
The Mugello circuit is the longest on the Italian F4 Championship and the visit marked the fourth round of the championship. Before the weekend officially kicked off a
pre-event test was laid on for all drivers and teams on the Wednesday which would give Olli his first taste of the circuit. It was tough, fast and very physically demanding with Olli making progress all day.
A day’s rest then took the drivers into Friday practice which would see two practice sessions and two qualifying sessions. The practice sessions never quite went
the way Olli or the team had planned. For various different reasons Olli was only able to put in a total of 19 laps over the two forty minute sessions leaving him on the back foot going into qualifying.
But in true Olli Caldwell fashion when the pressure was on and a good result looking somewhat unlikely, he turned things around and qualified 14th in both sessions in a grid that had over 20 of the best F4 drivers in Europe! It was a brilliant result and in the rookie class it put Olli 3rd and 4th on the grid with three podiums now the aim once again!
Olli got off to a decent start in race one and placed himself perfectly for turn once which took one or two prisoners and immediately brought out the safety car. At
this point Olli was 11th and on the restart he was very much involved in a battle for the lower order of the top ten. Setting consistent lap times even the likes of Artem Petrov were unable to catch him (a second year driver) and he fell just short of a top ten finish. But that wouldn’t matter as he made it his fourth consecutive podium of the season keeping his one hundred percent record going!
Race two was a much more difficult race for Olli, he lost a few places off the start and then got involved in a frustrating battle which seemed to last the entirety of
the race. Despite it’s long straights it became apparent Mugello was not so easy to overtake on, particularly when drivers take defending rules into their own hands! Despite this Olli finished 13th which is far from a disaster considering the lengthy safety car periods.
The weekend would end on a high though with Olli back on the rookie podium in race three! It was another stellar performance from Olli who could already be mistaken for a second year driver. It meant that Olli would take two out of three podiums to add to his clean sweep from his very first meeting at Vallelunga just a couple
of weeks ago. The fact he was 11th twice and knocking on the door is also hugely promising going forwards when you take the rookie element away from
it.
Olli Caldwell: “It was great to finish on the rookie podium twice at such a tough track. It was a shame that we couldn't make it three but finishing on the podium after a very tough third race made the result even better. I want to say a big thanks to the whole team for the weekend as well as all my sponsors and family for the continued support.:
The next race for Olli in the Italian F4 Championship will be at the legendary Imola Circuit on the 9th/10th September, but before then he has his next British F4 race at Snetterton next weekend and a trip to Nurburgring for ADAC F4 round five.