It may not have been the points haul that he was after but the latest round of the GP2 Series showed Alex Lynn that he has the pace to challenge championship leader Stoffel Vandoorne in the remainder of this year’s races.

The fourth round of the season at the Red Bull Ring in Austria saw Lynn, who is from Dunmow, secure his highest-ever finish in a main GP2 feature race as he drove from ninth on the starting grid to take third place behind Vandoorne and Sergey Sirotkin.

There were still elements that Lynn knows he and his DAMS team need to work on, but the speed he had in that opening race – which included having the fastest lap – demonstrated that he can topple the dominance of Vandoorne.

The Belgian is the runaway series leader at the moment and while the 21-year-old from Essex knows it will take something to overhaul that gap, he is confident that he can beat him on the track in the rest of this season’s races.

Lynn said: “I’m not thinking of Stoffel’s position in the championship, all I’m thinking about is beating him in every race. Whatever else happens, happens, but he does have a big lead at the moment.

“However, I do believe that I’m one of the only ones with the speed capable of beating him.

“We have the one thing that people all wish to have and that’s huge speed.

“But we have to make sure we are maximising it.

“The things that need fixing are the easy things to fix.

“Speed is the hard part and hopefully we can put it all together."

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