Weybridge’s Freddy Nordstrom won admirers in his first SEAT Eurocup race when he competed in the British round of the pan-Europe series at Brands Hatch on 18th-19th July in support of the World Touring Car Championship.
The Anglo-Swedish youngster raced into 5th and 6th places in the double header event and proved a comfortable front runner, not to mention two 2nds in a last minute pair of Fiat Arbarth races.
Having qualified in 6th position, the 20-year-oldy was confident his Advent Motorsport prepared SEAT Leon was on the pace for his Eurocup home event.
In the first race held on Saturday afternoon, which had a rolling start, he moved up to finish 5th but not before demonstrating his speed with the fastest third lap sector.
The second race on Sunday morning saw much cloudier conditions than the previous day. The top eight finishers from Race One lined up on the grid in reverse order, as such Freddy started from 4th on the grid.
After making a lightening start, Freddy was up into 2nd place and hot on the tail of the leader for nine laps when he was issued a drive through penalty.
The reason for this penalty was given as not being positioned correctly on the start grid – despite having been given the thumbs up by officials at the start! Reasons aside, the drive through lost Freddy valuable time but he came out to battle the remaining five laps and rise to a 6th place finish, and more points.
“I was very confident in the pace of the car this weekend” said Freddy. “From the second practice I knew we were competitive. We have made some very positive changes to the set up.
"I was looking for that podium finish in the second race so was gutted when called in for the penalty especially as I could think of no reason why! Got to chalk that up to ‘that’s motorsport’!
"That aside it’s been a positive weekend and I’m looking forward to getting back into SEAT Supercopa challenge at Portimao (Portugal) in a fortnight’s time”.
The weekend also brought plenty of podium joy for Freddy. A last minute chance came up to race in the Fiat Arbarth series which had two races at the Brands Hatch meeting. Never one to say no to a race, Freddy was straight into the car and despite having never driven it before finished 2nd in both races behind experience British Touring Car racer, Adam Jones.
“The Arbarths were a lot of fun and quite challenging to drive, especially after jumping straight out of the SEAT Leon into the Arbarth for a couple of sessions!” said Freddy.
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