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FIA  FORMULA 3000 : PENKER RACING Pilot Rob Nguyen tested the new LOLA F 3000 in Valencia. - „The Experts were astonished!“

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The racing-career of Rob Nguyen is extremely short, nevertheless with every apperiance he causes a sensation. Rob Nguyen (say: Enguyen) is Australian of vietnamese origin.and drives with Swiss licence, but driving he has learnt in Austria at PENKER RACING. His previous career can be discribed with few words.

November  2000

Rob sits in a racing car for the first time, he gets through a Formula training-programme at PENKER RACING.

2001 Formula VW  German Championship.

with PENKER RACING Team 1x Pole, 2 plateform-places and 5. in the championship, against race drivers – most of them have already got 3 – 5 years racing-experiance.

November  2001

1. F3000  Test at Team Ghinzani, with a car of the European championship.

0,1 Sec behind the team record on this circuit, 0.7 Sek faster than the present team.racer, who has been the 9. in the championship 2001.

December  2001

Great apperiance at the Karttrophy in Wr. Neustadt, where he reached the sensational 2^nd place, only beat by F1 pilot Thomas Enge, before some other F1 pilots as Fisicella , Wurz and Andrea Piccini,  F1 test-driver at Minardi and PENKER RACING pilot. 

January  2002

Next PENKER RACING Pilot in F 3000

New car, new circuit, much pressure weighed upon Rob Nguyen. W.Penker had arranged the test-deal with Team Astromega , where Rob was the topic of conversation as team-driver 2002.

On 23rd of January 09.30 the test began. R. Nguyen went on the very selective circuit. After a few turns the skepticsm of the team-members was gone. They already knew how few experience the Penker protégé had and were worried about the new car.

Precise statements, no overdriving of the ref-limit, as well as turn-times that only skilled pilots drive, extremely impressed the present specialists.

With a time of 1.24.88 on the 1st day Nguyen was only 1.3 sec behind the Brazilian M. Haberfeld, who drove with new slicks.

On the 2nd day Rob was able to enhance his performance once more and marked a time of 1.23.62, with this time he came 0,8 sec behind M. Haberfelds 1.22.80. The second present Brazilian with more F 3000 experience ,Rodrigo Sperafico could reach a time of 1.23.29 with Rob´s car and only was 0.33 sec faster than the newcomer.

Nguyen´s time was faster than Patrik Friesacher´s last-year F 3000 Test-best time.

At last it should be said that on these dasy the Penker pupil made absolute no mistakes.

With this test the Australian justified in a most impressive way the admission to REMUS junior-furtherance, according the motto of the second main-sponsor OVB, „Success makes fun and always present at the top“.

FIA  F 3000  Championship  2002

The Team Astromega is extremely inspired by Rob. The only doubts are his small experience. We wish that nevertheless the fast and ambitious PENKER RACING pilot will get a fix-place for this year´s FIA F3000 championship soon, because he really will be an enrichment in this scene. 

PS: As well present at the test was the next PENKER RACING pilot, Andreas Zuber who also gets the REMUS junior-furtherance. (He was 0.1 sec. faster at the 1st test with Ghinzani team than the permanent pilot). A.Zuber almost began to cry, as he was not planned for this test in the wonderful new LOLA 02/50. As his performances for 2002 meet the requirements it will be the start for Andreas till autumn.