First Podium at le Mans.

Click the images to download free for editorial use pictures (Magny-Cours: Pro-Photos Sport, Le Mans: Alexia Ortega and DR).

Alexandra Hervé raises her game at Magny-Cours and climbs up her first podium finish at Le Mans!

As Alexandra Hervé continues her first season in the Formule Renault Cup by TTE the rewards are starting to accumulate. At Magny-Cours, the young driver from the North of Paris scored her best result of the year in the sixth round of the championship with an eighth-place finish. A week later on the Le Mans Bugatti circuit against opposition made up of the single-seater drivers in the FFSA French Circuits Cup she scored her first-ever podium finish in motor racing!

Alexandra had already driven on the Magny-Cours circuit in February in the collective TTE tests. But at the time it was a question of getting to grips with her Tatuus Formula Renault 2.0 single-seater and coping with the 210 bhp put out through a 7-speed gearbox by its 2-litre engine capable of propelling the car to a top speed of 230 kph – exactly 228,3 kph according to the timekeepers’ sheets at the former French Grand Prix venue.

On this autumn weekend the aim was very different. The Hervé David Racing team driver was determined to concretise her progress as the end of the season approaches. Soon it will be time to assess the results and plot the future of her sporting project. Armed with this motivation and her growing talent she set the 11th-best time in the first qualifying session, which decided the grid positions for race 1. At the end of the 17 laps she finished ninth. In the second qualifying session she moved up to ninth. She suffered a touch of wheel spin at the start of race 2, but she more than made up for it in the Adelaïde hairpin where she slipped past two rivals to slot into eighth place. Despite the incessant attacks of a pursuer who finished less than a second behind, she held on to this position till the chequered flag. Alexandra is definitely the type of driver who isn’t easily rattled!

“I tackled practice with room for improvement,” was how the driver from Deuil-la-Barre analysed the situation. “But I found a few tweaks in race 1 to improve my times and others in race 2 in which I pushed really hard as the guy behind me wanted to take my place! I’m proud of my double overtaking move in the Adelaïde curve. I took advantage of slipstreaming and at the end of the straight they all hugged the apex to defend their places. So I went round on the outside keeping up a good speed to slip round the corner. I feel I’ve progressed in terms of speed and also in race management.”

The day of the podium dawns!

Then the question arose about taking part the following week in a FFSA French Circuits Cup round in the context of the Inter Ecuries ACO event. “The advantage of participating was to prepare for the final round of the Formule Renault Cup at Le Mans in two weeks time,” justified Alexandra. The field was a mixed bag with some single-seaters that were supposed to be quicker than hers: three Formula 3 cars, four Formula Masters, five FR 2.0s from the same generation as Alexandra’s and six older ones: in all a total of 18 cars.

On the programme was a qualifying session and two races. Alexandra set the sixth-fastest time in qualifying and worked her way up to fourth place in race 1. Race 2 followed the same scenario except that the leader retired on the last lap catapulting her onto the third step of the podium where Bruno Vandestick, “The voice of the 24 Hours of Le Mans,” honoured her with an interview. And to say that it was basically a preparatory race…

“It was a good idea to come here, for my first podium and for the experience of starting on the third row, my best position so far on a grid. I’ve understood to what extent that helps you to have a good race! I also needed to learn this very technical track and we have now found our marks giving us a good working baseline with which to tackle the final major challenge of the season.” And that will be at Le Mans 11 – 13 November!

A big thank you to my partners: Shop-racing, MMA Deuil-la-Barre, COFIF, Gudin concept.

FR Cup by TTE ranking after 12 out of 14 races :

1 CHAPPARD Franck 1670

2 ANTONEL Quentin 1315

3 TROJANI Paul 1300

4 NARAC Raphaël 1150

5 GOSSELIN Willyam 1048

6 CLAVAUD Jérémy 930

7 REBUS Alain 900

8 COPERCHINI Serge 760

9 PRUDENT Adeline 660

10 HERVE Alexandra 609

11 AIMARD Thierry 496

12 MALHOMME Thierry 315

13 LEMASSON Pierre 270

14 POULAT Jérôme 221

15 VUAGNAT Eric 220

16 KLYMENKO Ivan 170

17 COUSSERANT Nicolas 165

18 DEYRES Frédéric 152

19 BOUCHE Julien 150

20 HAROUT Daniel 150

21 FERSTLER Dorian 125

22 CHOUKROUN Grégory 105

23 TATERKA Enzo 95

24 MOREL Tristan 93

25 BENECH Maxence 91

26 BUCHER Alain 80

27 MORAND Stéphane 80

28 BRONDEAU Pascal 76

29 DESTANDAU François 45

30  GASPAR Miguel 0