King upbeat after Russian podium confirms championship progress

In a cat-and-mouse opening encounter, King, having qualified in second, initially piled the pressure upon race and championship leader Esteban Ocon.

However, as his tyres began to fade, he found himself being hunted down by Max Verstappen and experienced F3 contender Tom Blomqvist, with little to separate the front-running quartet.

Refusing to buckle under the mounting threat, King produced a magnificent defence to artfully stave them off, even summoning up enough extra pace to home back in on Ocon by the time the chequered flag fell.

The second outing the next day transpired to be a distinctly processional affair, with scarcely an overtaking move in sight.

King rapidly settled into a five-way scrap over the runner-up spoils and took advantage of a mid-race problem for Verstappen to advance to fifth where he would stay to the end.

The 20-year-old looked set to complete his weekend’s work in race three with a fourth-place finish only for a coming-together with Lucas Auer to damage his car’s suspension and consign him to an early bath.

Still, having vaulted up the points table from eighth into sixth, King is justifiably bullish about his prospects for the remaining four meetings.

“It felt like things had started to come together at the Norisring so I headed to Moscow in confident frame of mind,” said King.

“Overall, there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic as we made further progress and gained some more ground in the championship.

“It’s taken a little while to get there, admittedly, but it feels like our season has finally got going.”