This year the Finnish Championship series of Formula Ford will be driven as a shorter two round series covering altogether six races. The season was opened in Kemora Circuit last Saturday, where Milla Mäkelä was fighting for her goal, which is a medal in the series. On the same date in the teams home town the long tradition of naming the villager of the year aka “Vuoden Ranttinen” was announced. This year the honor came to Mäkelä Racing Team for our long and successful work in the field of motorsports and for the publicity achieved not only for our Team but also for the town even internationally. Mäkelä Racing Team wants to thank their home town for the honor and hopes to keep up the good work together!
The season 2017 in Formula Ford will be a challenging one, not only because Milla has four rivals in the Duratec class who have all won a championship medal or title in the past years in Formula Ford, but also because this is the first year with wings allowed. “The wings add a lot of character to the looks of the car and also a bit of speed. Fords had to be driven in a small drift all the time before the wings. Now you just have to floor the gas pedal and the wings will keep it on the gound in the corners. I’m not sure which is better, mabye the wings fit to my driving style more, but it sure was fun to let it slip too.” Milla commented on the update. The three first starts already showed that the series will be extremely even. All the drivers were inside few tenths of a second in the qualifying and there was no way to overtake in the races unless someone made a mistake.
Milla had some problems with the brakes in the qualifying, so the result was not so great 5th place. The racing routine gathered this year in the BMW Xtreme class showed off though in the first race. Milla took an amazing start putting herself on the third place before the first corner. She dropped to P4 during the first lap, but the confidence with the cool tires and brakes helped her to get back to P3 and hold the position until the end of the race despite a few technical problems.
“For the second race the gear shift line was fixed so I was able to consentrate on other things aswell and not only for getting the right gear on in the braking. Though my race was doomed in the first corner when a competitor was pushing me to the inside line and I got jammed behid the slow line dropping me to P5. There was no way to overtake, since we still had a problem with the brakes. Luckily the guy who pushed me took a jump start and was dropped behind me in the results.” Milla commented on the second start.
In the last race the brakes were fixed and Milla said that the car was brilliant to drive. She got up from starting position 5 to P4 in the first lap, but a small mistake dropped her back to P5. The competitor in P2 made even bigger mistake making all cars from P2 to P5 come to a hard braking in one group. “The guys were three in a row there for the braking and I had the pace to jump in as fourth car, but there was really no place to go!” Milla laughed. Mabye it was good, cause one competitor lost his front wing in the corner and he dropped far from the others. Milla Finished the race in P4.
“Quite ok weekend. The pace was good and the whole team did a great job, but that tiny bit of something just wasn’t there this weekend to put us on top, so the results were quite flat.” Milla said. The team did have a few tricks in mind for the next race even before heading home, so at the end of September there is only one goal: to win!
Millas Mini Race
Milla also took part in touring car race with a Mini on 9th of July and finished 4th in the overall race. Thank you Jyri Ahonen for the fun opportunity.