The official victory
Winning the Sprint and Feature Race in the space of a single weekend is not a scenario you often see in Formula 2, and this weekend that's exactly what he managed to do Isack Hadjar. It's a shame that the French driver had to serve a penalty for the accident that occurred at the start of the Sprint with Martì, relegating him to sixth position. Feature, however, gave back the celebration that had been taken away from the Hitech driver, who was lucky to play the tire change strategy at the perfect moment after a twist that revolutionized the fate of the race.
Safety Car decisive
In the first half of the Feature, in fact, the real protagonist seemed to be Dennis Hauger, author of the pole position and good at maintaining the leadership even after Andrea Kimi Antonelli's excellent shot from the second spot on the starting grid. Furthermore, the two also battled during the first two laps, with the Norwegian emerging victorious from the duel. However, as per the rules, it is in the Feature pit stops are mandatory to change tyres, with the two drivers returning to the pit lane together on lap nine. Having gone out on cold tyres, Hauger then made a sensational mistake two laps later, losing control of his MP Motorsport entering Turn 6 and crashing. impact against barriersthus abandoning any chance of victory.
With the car stopped and damaged on the track, the Race Direction introduced the regime Virtual Safety Car (later converted to Safety Car) at the perfect moment for Hadjar, who returned to the pits to change tires and emerged as the virtual leader of the race right in front of Antonelli. At the restart, the Frenchman then managed to overtake two riders in front of him who had not yet stopped, increasing his advantage over the 17-year-old from Bologna. At the same time, the young talent from Prema was unable to get rid of Barnard in time, remaining like this stuck in traffic and with Aaron threatening behind him. An overtaking that the Estonian completed on the 20th lap, with Antonelli in obvious difficulty with the hard tyres, to the point of even losing the virtual podium a few laps from the end with the return of Maloney. In this way, Antonelli concluded al 4th placewith the regret of missing the podium but with the best personal result achieved so far in Formula 2.
F2 / Australia 2024, Feature Race: order of arrival
| POS. | PILOT | TEAM | TIME/GAP |
| 1 | Isack Hadjar | Campos | 33 laps |
| 2 | Paul Aron | Hitech | +4.4 |
| 3 | Zane Maloney | Rodin | +9.6 |
| 4 | Andrea Kimi Antonelli | Press | +12.9 |
| 5 | Miyata returns | Rodin | +13.6 |
| 6 | Richard Verschoor | Trident | +18.0 |
| 7 | Franco Colapinto | MP Motorsport | +19.7 |
| 8 | Rafael Villagomez | Van Amersfoort | +23.6 |
| 9 | Victor Martins | ART Grand Prix | +25.0 |
| 10 | Oliver Bearman | Press | +29.4 |
| 11 | Jack Crawford | DAMS | +31.1 |
| 12 | Amaury Cordeel | Hitech | +33.8 |
| 13 | Kush Maini | Invicta | +34.0 |
| 14 | Josep Maria Martì | Campos | +34.5 |
| 15 | Juan Manuel Correa | DAMS | +41.7 |
| 16 | Roman Stanek | Trident | +58.1 |
| 17 | Taylor Barnard | PHM AIX | +59.3 |
| 18 | Enzo Fittipaldi | Van Amersfoort | +69.1 |
| 19 | Dennis Hauger | MP Motorsport | Withdraw |
| 20 | Zak O'Sullivan | ART Grand Prix | Withdraw |
| 21 | Gabriel Bortoleto | Invicta | Withdraw |
| 22 | Joshua Durksen | PHM AIX | Withdraw |
Appointment in Emilia-Romagna!
For F2, as well as for Formula 3, a long stop period now begins which will end on May 17ththe day on which the categories will take to the track at Imolaon the 'Enzo e Dino Ferrari' circuit, for the first European round of the championship, the third of the season for Formula 2.
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