Sprint Race

PREMA Racing’s Oliver Bearman took his first victory of the season in the Spielberg Sprint race with a controlling performance against Josep Maria Marti of Campos Racing.

A stellar start from Bearman saw him steal the lead from pole-sitter Kush Maini on the lead-up to Turn 1. Maini proceeded to lose another place later on in the lap to the eventual second-placed car of Marti.

It only took until the end of Lap 3 for Bearman to have extended his lead over the next best driver to over 2 seconds. Marti was also out of DRS range of the Invicta of Maini in third, who in turn coming under pressure from Taylore Barnard, Paul Aron and his own teammate Gabriel Bortoleto.

The gaps begun to close at the start of Lap 6, with Marti having moved within a second and a half of Bearman, whilst Maini was now within DRS range of the Campos driver.

Barnard however, seemed to have a lack of pace in the AIX Racing car dropping out of touch from Maini in the battle for P3 and then being overtaken on the inside by Aron at Turn 3, dropping him down to fifth.

Lap 7 saw Bearman’s comfortable lead gone as Marti was now within DRS range and Maini just behind. Barnard seem to continue to struggle with Bortoleto completing an overtake at Turn 2, before losing another place to the MP Motorsport of Franco Colapinto only a couple of laps later.

Maini seemed to be beginning to struggle on Lap 20 as he fell out of DRS range on Marti ahead. He then lost a further two places to Aron and Bortoleto at the exit of Turn 3 on the following lap.

The end of Lap 26, saw Bearman again extend his lead to over a second from Marti, whilst Bortoleto was just waiting for Aron to make a mistake to take the last podium position. Maini still seemed to be fighting a losing battle, dropping to seventh place after being overtaken by the MP Motorsport pair of Colapinto and Hauger.

On the final lap Bearman had extended his lead of the race once again to nearly two seconds before he took the chequered flag and victory ahead of Marti, while Aron managed to hold of Bortoleto for the final podium place.

Hauger finished ahead of his teammate Colapinto for sixth, with the latter spinning after contact with his teammate at the exit of Turn 3. This meant Crawford finished sixth followed by Maini in seventh and Duerksen took the final point fo the Sprint race in P8.

Feature Race

Gabriel Bortoleto took his maiden Formula 2 victory in an action-packed Spielberg Feature Race on Sunday. He took the lead early on from Joshua Duerksen before managing a controlled race to take the win ahead of Franco Colapinto and Isack Hadjar.

Before the race even started drama occurred, with three drivers stalling at the star of the formation lap, including pole-sitter Dennis Hauger, as well as Kush Maini and Jak Crawford, meaning the trio would have to start the race from the pitlane.

Ultimately this left Duerksen as the leading car on the grid and he made a fast charge off the line when the race eventually got underway, ahead of Bortoleto, Colapinto and Championship leader Paul Aron.

On Lap 4, Duerksen and Bortoleto were fighting for the lead with the Brazilian making a dive down the inside at Turn 4 to take P1. Duerksen was again passed on the inside on the next lap by Colapinto on the entry to Turn 3.

Lap 6 saw the Virtual Safety Car deployed due to Zane Maloney stopping on track with it being speculated as a result of a mechanical failure on the car. Marshal’s eventually cleared the track and racing was resumed with many of the drivers who had started the race on the supersoft tyres pitting for the soft tyres.

Those who pitted included: Marti, Duerksen, Bortoleto, Barnard, Verschoor and Andrea Kimi Antonelli. The PREMA driver had trouble in the pitlane after stalling and dropping to the back of the grid after a charging performance earlier on to move from 16th to 10th.

Paul Aron of Hitech Pulse-Eight was handed a five second time-penalty and 1 penalty point after he changed directions multiple times under breaking in a previous battle with Hadjar at Turn 3.

Lap 18 saw Paul Aron pass Duerksen, whilst further ahead, Bortoleto was right behind rival Marti, making a dive down the inside at Turn 3 to take the eventual lead of the race.

The Campos Racing duo were in a battle on Lap 32, whilst the leader Colapinto came into the pits for his mandatory pit-stop, rejoining the track in eighth place behind the battling duo of Fittipaldi and Duerksen. The Argentinian soon passed the two drivers on Lap 35 at Turn 3 and 4, moving up to fifth place and 3 seconds behind Aron.

Meanwhile, out in front Bortoleto now had an advantage of over three and a half seconds over Hadjar, with the Campos Racing driver under pressure from the likes of Marti, Aron and a charging Colapinto.

The MP Motorsport driver was flying around the Spielberg track after his mandatory pitstop, overtaking Aron for P4 at Turn 4 on Lap 38, before overtaking Marti for a place on the podium on the next lap. This did not seem to be enough for Colapinto as on the final lap he overtook Hadjar for second place.

There was no catching Bortoleto though as he came home in first place to take his maiden win in Formula 2. Colapinto took second place ahead of Hadjar, with Marti and Fittipaldi rounding out the top 5.

Aron’s five second time-penalty saw him dropped down to the P6 at the line ahead of Duerksen and Cordeel, with Taylor Barnard of AIX Racing in P9 and Zak O’Sullivan of ART Grand Prix rounding out the took 10 and taking home the final points of the race.