When you’re in motorsport and your surname is Doohan, winning is expected.
Which is why Jack Doohan found himself at a low-ebb in 2020, a season that saw him finish the F3 championship without a single point.
It even saw him question whether or not he was the problem.
“Last year was very difficult, and I wasn’t really in a good position in the team,” Doohan told Wide World of Sports.
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“Things just weren’t gelling, and it was a really compact season, nine rounds in eleven weeks, which didn’t make it easier to assess the problems and make any big changes. Once things went wrong it was so hard to it back on track.”
Doohan drove for the HWA Racelab team, alongside another famous name, Enzo Fittipaldi, grandson of double world champion Emerson, as well as Jake Hughes.
The fact that Hughes won a race on the way to amassing 111.5 points made it even tougher for the Australian. Was it possible he just didn’t have the talent to reach the top?
“There were points in 2020 where for sure, I thought maybe I wasn’t quick enough. I was quite confused to be honest,” he admitted candidly.
His viewpoint changed very quickly in October, however, when he switched to the Trident team for the post-season test in Spain. He topped the times at the Jerez circuit, and put in another impressive performance in Barcelona during pre-season testing earlier this year.
“Once I hopped in the Trident car, the first lap I did at Barcelona in testing this year, which has always been one of my weaker circuits, immediately I was straight on the pace,” Doohan said.
“I was still losing some time in the last sector, which is quite slow, and we even went for another track walk that evening, and then on day two a problem that I’d been struggling with for a few years was sorted.
“Almost as soon as I got in the Trident car my confidence came back.”
Sorting out the issue of where he’d drive for 2021 was done relatively early, a move that Doohan said paid dividends once the season had started.
Zero points in 2020 turned into 179 points in 2021, including wins in France, Belgium (twice) and Russia, on the way to second in the F3 championship behind Prema driver Dennis Hauger.
Doohan also led Trident to the teams championship, ending Prema’s stranglehold on the title.
“I was able to partner with Trident quite early on for 2021, which meant we could work through post-season testing, which gave us a really good head start to get the ball rolling for 2021,” he explained.
“We were on the front foot, whereas if there’d been a delay in sorting out a deal for 2021 then it just delays the process of getting started.
“To get runner-up was awesome, obviously as a second-year driver I had the experience, but the team helped me develop quite a lot, particularly in my weak areas, like slow-speed corners, where I struggled in 2020.”
F3 and F2 adopted a different format in 2021, with three races each weekend instead of the previous two, and an expanded reverse grid format.
That change didn’t help the 18-year-old.
“It was difficult this year, because we had some quite odd grids, with the top 12 being reversed,” Doohan explained.
“It was so important to stay out of trouble. Usually it’s hard to overtake, so I worked on staying safe, even if that meant losing a position instead of gaining one. It wasn’t worth the risk for the sake of a few points, but in the end that probably cost me the championship, because I lost all my points in the reverse grid races.
“It’s about learning, but going from pole on Friday evening after qualifying, to 12th on the grid on Saturday was tough. The guy who qualifies 12th is usually a little bit off the pace, and now all of a sudden he’s on pole, and he’s defending for his life.
“It’s quite tricky, but it was something that we knew about before the season, and it was the same for everyone, so you just manage it as best you can.”
Doohan was understandably cagey about his plans for 2022, with nothing set in stone just yet. But if the whispers are to be believed, an F2 campaign with the front-running Virtuosi outfit is in the works.
Just as important is a rumoured switch from the Red Bull Junior Team to the Alpine Academy, the same program that has propelled fellow Australian Oscar Piastri into F1 as Alpine’s reserve driver for next season.
“Yeah, it’s looking like F2,” Doohan confirmed.
“At the moment, I’m looking elsewhere (rather than sticking with Trident), but nothing is confirmed yet, there’s still a few options, but hopefully I’m in a title contending car.
“At the moment I’m a Red Bull driver, and I’m contracted until the end of the year. We’ll see what the future holds, I’m very happy with where I am and my partnership with Red Bull.
“But we’ll see what happens going forward and what they want to do.”
Doohan’s F3 success has capped a strong period for Australia in the junior motorsport categories. Piastri won the same championship last year, and appears headed for the F2 title this year, while Remy Gardner won the Moto2 championship earlier this month.
“Hopefully we can all make it to the top at the same time, I so happy for Remy,” Doohan said.
“We went down and had a bite to eat with him a couple of weeks ago, the week before Portimao. He’s an awesome bloke, I’m so happy to see him win the championship. Moto3 and Moto2 are so hard, with Oscar in F2 and Remy it’s great to see.
“Oscar has been a bit unfortunate, he deserves an F1 seat, he’s quick enough, I’m sure he’ll get his chance, even if it doesn’t happen until 2023.
“That’s one year later than it should be, but he’ll get his chance.
“I just hope I can follow in his footsteps.”
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