MOTORSPORT: Australia's new international race winner
Teenager Anton De Pasquale is following in fellow Australian Daniel Ricciardo's tracks in Europe with a winning start to his career in Formula RenaultAnton De Pasquale is about where Daniel Ricciardo was six years ago – racing in Formula Renault in Europe, and winning.
De Pasquale, 18 and winner of the last Australian Formula Ford Championship in 2013, won both races in the opening round of the Formula Renault 1.6 Northern European Championship at Holland's Zandvoort circuit on Easter Monday.
It was an excellent start to his international career, although there were only 14 cars in the races compared with almost 40 in many of those when Ricciardo rose to prominence within motorsport in 2008. During that period, Ricciardo won the Formula Renault West European Championship and placed runner-up in the category's Eurocup.
Now Ricciardo's a Formula One star with Red Bull Racing, upstaging his four-time world champion teammate Sebastian Vettel.
De Pasquale, from Werribee south-west of Melbourne, is driving for Austrian team Lechner Racing School, based in Salzburg. In both of Monday's races he started from pole position.
Formula Renault is the first of the "wings and slicks" categories of junior open-wheeler racing in Europe. It's a category Australia does not have.
Ricciardo never did Formula Ford seriously, instead advancing from karting in Western Australia to the Formula BMW series in Asia and Formula Renault in Europe, initially in Italy.
De Pasquale's path has been different, via Formula Ford but making a rapid transition to the "wings and slicks" in Formula Renault overseas while still a teenager.
The 4.3km Zandvoort circuit hosted Dutch Formula One grands prix many years ago and since has become known as the home of the annual Formula Three Masters, the unofficial world championship in that category.
In the first of Monday's Formula Renault races De Pasquale beat Dutchman Larry TenVoorde, a second-year Formula Renault driver, by about three seconds, while his Lechner teammates, Austrian Florian Janits and Hungarian Ferdinand Habsburg, finished fourth and seventh.
TenVoorde jumped De Pasquale at the start but the Australian had the lead after two laps. In the second race De Pasquale won by about eight seconds from Habsburg with TenVoorde third.
"I'm very happy with the double win," De Pasquale said. "In the first race it was a great move [overtaking TenVoorde], no contact, just fighting for position as it should be in motorsports.
"In the second race I started well and could pull a gap and won the race again. It might have seemed easy, but it really wasn't.
"Now I look forward to Spa [the second round of the series at an even more famous circuit in Belgium at the start of June]."
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