Luke Browning wins the Macau Grand Prix – thanks to considered starting tactics? The Williams Junior has “looked at all the starts again” to learn from them
Luke Browning celebrates a dominant start-finish victory at the 2023 Macau Grand Prix. The Hitech driver only came under pressure twice: at the regular start and after the safety car phase, when the competition launched an attack that the Williams junior successfully fended off. Browning defended on the inside both times as he braked for the Lisboa corner – for good reason!
“I looked back at every start in Macau and this seemed to be the one with the highest success rate,” said the happy Macau winner in an interview with Motorsport.com. And: At the restart after the interruption that was necessary following Paul Aron’s violent fire accident, Browning only accelerated shortly before the finish line.
“It’s a very long straight. I didn’t want to make it any longer. So I accelerated as late as possible,” reveals the newly crowned Formula 3 world champion. “There is less slipstream at slow speeds. So everything I did was very calculated.”
“I tried to lose them coming out of the last corner, but I think the straights are so long that you always have someone next to you in turn 3,” says Broning. “But that’s the magic of Macau, you have to brake late. “
Nevertheless, the Hitech driver took a high risk, especially on cold tires, to stay ahead of the competition. “I think I just took more risks, to be honest,” he suspects. “But the risk was worth it, because when you overcome that gap, you obviously break the DRS.”
“So breaking through that on the first lap is absolutely crucial in order not to have anyone breathing down your neck. And that was exactly my goal,” says Browning, who was able to pull away from the competition on the first lap of the race. “Fortunately, we did it and I’m very pleased. It’s very satisfying to see my name on the winner’s list. It feels surreal. “
