F2: Berman wins sprint behind safety car

After yesterday’s qualifying in Baku, the grid for Saturday’s sprint in Formula 2 has been slightly adjusted, following a fine that Theo Purscher received.

The French ART driver, Alfa Romeo reserve driver and student of the Sauber Academy finished third on Friday but lost three places on the grid. The stewards believed that Purscher interfered with Campos team rider Cush Maini during qualifying. Therefore, in the sprint he did not start from 8th position, but from 11th. Accordingly, Enzo Fittipaldi (to 8th), Oliver Berman (to 9th), and Maini’s partner Ralph Boschung (to 10th), moved up one position.

The already quite experienced Richard Fershhor of Van Amersfoort Racing started from pole position today, but Zane Maloney, a Formula 2 debutant, started the race from second position and made no secret of his very militant mood.

At the start he really managed to get ahead but Victor Marten, who had famously started third, edged sharply to the left and hooked his Dallara, immediately ruining the race for him. Fershhor, in turn, did not fit into the first corner, the front fender of his car was damaged and, in addition, he suffered a puncture in the rear wheel.

Maloney remained in first place for only a few seconds: Fershhor’s car bounced off him on the exit of the first corner and Zane’s right rear wheel also punctured.

Yellow flags appeared, Maloney slowly made his way back to the pits, his mechanics were changing the wheels and the battle on the track resumed in the meantime. However, the race was soon neutralized again: Boschung hit a barrier at the exit of the 11th turn, which is located in the old town, and apparently damaged the suspension, as he was forced to stop on the track. The safety car drove off.

This leg of the race saw Dennis Hauger, who started sixth, the Saturday sprint winner in the previous Australian stage of the youth series, lead; Marten rode second, Jehan Daruvala third.

The restart was uneventful, Hauger kept first position and after one circle he managed to pull away from Martin by about 0.8 seconds, and it was clear that the Frenchman was preparing an attack on the long start and finish straight. Meanwhile, Frederic Vesti was already putting pressure on Daruwala in an attempt to fight for the podium.

But it was not he who won back the position, but Oliver Berman, who took over fifth place from Jack Crawford, and at the same time showed the best lap time. But on the next lap, Vesti was able to finish the job – the Dane overtook Daruwala, and not in a straight line, but in a series of 5th and 6th corners. Then Berman also traded with Jehan, but already on a straight line along the coast Neftchilar Avenue.

On lap 11, Ayumu Iwasa, who was leading the individual standings until the Azerbaijani stage, retired due to technical difficulties – it seems that the DAMS team’s car had an engine problem.

When the last third of the distance remained before the finish, Hauger remained in the lead and broke away from Marten by more than a second, Vesti was third, Berman gradually overtook him. Slightly more interesting developments occurred towards the end of the top ten, where Arthur Leclerc actively put pressure on Enzo Fittipaldi, but had to stop attacking as yellow flags returned to the track and then the safety car also took off.

This time Roy Nissany failed to fit into turn 15, causing the suspension on the right side of the car to break against the guard rails. He also damaged the fence of the track, so there was a risk that restoring order on the track would take a long time.

In the 19th lap, ie just three laps from the finish, they restarted. But even before that, Maloney, who returned to the track after an early forced pit stop and was running last, now retired from the race completely.

But here the race had to be neutralized again, because several collisions occurred on the restart: neither the leading Hauger nor Marten fit into the first corner, and Daruwala also crashed into the Frenchman’s car.

Theo Purcher and Arthur Leclair, who followed, had to react to these incidents and had no choice but to retire in the relegation zone as well. In addition, Jack Duane’s car spun on the same corner.

But Oliver Berman made the best use of the emergency situation: before the restart he was in 4th, in the 1st corner he managed to avoid the broken cars of his rivals and overtook Vesti before the yellow flags were out.

The safety car took off, but it was clear there was no point in restarting the race, so she finished in the pit lane behind the red Mercedes of Bernd Maylander, the FIA ​​safety car’s regular driver. However, the joy of the winner, Oliver Berman, was not diminished: yesterday he took his first pole position, and today his debut victory. One of the first to congratulate him on this success was Frederic Vasseur, as the 17-year-old Briton is a student of the Ferrari Racing Academy.

Second place was taken by Frederic Vesti, third by Jack Crawford, fourth by Kush Maini, and Enzo Fittipaldi rounded out the top five.

Despite the retirement, Ayumu Iwasa remained the leader of the individual standings as few of his main rivals managed to finish today.

Sprint results on Saturday