Hugh Barter took a pulsating victory in the opening race of the Spanish F4 Championship at the Algarve International Circuit.
The Australian came out on top after some superb wheel to wheel racing with Tymoteusz Kucharczyk and Valerio Rinicella in Portugal.
Barter got a great start leading into Turn 1 after starting in third taking advantage of Nikola Tsolov stalling from pole position.
He explained after the race to InsideF2 that the victory was hard fought: “Yeah so the race was pretty intense that’s for sure after getting a good start and coming out of the first couple of corners in P1 it wasn’t such an easy win from there.”
The 16-year-old triumphed in a three way duel with Polish driver Kucharczyk and Rinicella that saw Barter and the Pole swap positions lap after lap in the closing stages and make light contact at Turn 11.
“There was definitely some hard fighting with Tymo [Tymoteusz Kucharczyk] and [Valerio] Rinicella and then midway through the race I dropped back to P3 and then I managed to climb my way back to P1 in the last two laps I think It was and then managed to cross the line in first.
So it was a very intense race and a lot of pressure keeping the pace up in the mid stages where we struggled a bit more but in the end we came back strong and got away with the win.”
The Melbournian has made an incredibly strong start to the 2022 season dominating Round 1 of the French F4 campaign at Nogaro and winning the first race in Spanish F4.
Barter will start Race 2 from fourth place on the grid at Algarve.
