King crowned top rookie after trio of top-ten F3 finishes

In a disrupted qualifying session, persistent traffic woes restricted the talented young Warwickshire ace to just tenth on the grid for race one and eighth for race two.

Fifth spot for race three was rather more representative of his potential, however, and carried his top ten qualifying tally for the season to an impressive 22 - half of them inside the top five.

From there, King raced well in the opening encounter to progress to sixth, pushing hard and maintaining the pressure on his fifth-placed rival right the way to the chequered flag.

In the next outing, the McLaren Autosport Award finalist conceded a position early on but was relentless in his efforts to reclaim it, with his dogged determination paying off on the penultimate lap following an entertaining wheel-to-wheel duel that lasted several corners.

Race three promised to be the best of all with King going in with fresh tyres.

However, torrential rain scuppered the strategy with puddles causing many of the cars to aquaplane in treacherous conditions, including King’s.

“I ran fifth early on in a three-way battle for third and I was feeling optimistic,” said King.

“But visibility was really bad and as I tried to keep out of the spray of the car ahead along the straight, I hit a big puddle.

“That sent me into an instant spin, and I rejoined down in 13th.

“It was an exciting race after that and we were pretty quick as we fought back into the top ten - which certainly wasn’t easy in those conditions.”

He made a stirring recovery as he scythed his way grittily past his adversaries into ninth place. The result marked the rapid Stoneleigh-based hotshot’s 20th top-ten finish of what has been an outstanding campaign and secured him sixth spot in the final points table - by some margin the leading F3 rookie.

Not only that, but King distinguished himself as one of just six contenders to have scored in every meeting, and although he still has one appearance left on his 2013 calendar - the non-championship Macau Grand Prix in mid-November - his attentions are already beginning to shift towards the next step.

He said: “It was always going to be a long shot to finish fifth overall in Europe and I certainly wasn’t disheartened to end up sixth.

“It’s been a really strong season, which is obviously encouraging looking ahead to 2014 .

“And if we work hard over the winter to build upon everything we have learned this year, hopefully we will come out all guns blazing in a few months’ time.”