After the finish of Saturday’s Formula 2 sprint, it was announced about the disqualification of Taylor Barnard, a British driver of the German team, now called AIX Racing.
Barnard attracted attention a few weeks ago when he successfully replaced the injured Sam Bird at McLaren in Formula E, but this weekend he was unlucky: the F2 debutant finished 8th in the sprint yesterday, but it later turned out that there was of violation of the technical regulations.
The stewards were informed that the special start mode had not been activated on car No. 25 before the start of the race, and this is considered a breach of Article 1.6.1 of the Formula 2 Technical Regulations. Barnard was thus deprived of the bonus robbed yesterday of deserved point for 8th place, and Kush Maini, an Indian racer from Invicta Racing, took 8th place in the official sprint protocol.
In the main race of the weekend, Barnard started from twelfth place and Gabriel Bortoleto, Maini’s teammate, started from pole, but on the second row of the grid was the car of Oliver Berman, the Prema driver, who was in the race. a very militant mood.
As soon as the starting traffic lights went out, he made his intentions known: Oliver took the lead from the very first moments and took advantage of the fact that Bortoleto was slightly delayed at the start. By the way, it was not only he who benefited from the Brazilian driver’s mistake, Isaac Hajjar and Joshua Duerksen also overtook Gabriel.
In contrast to yesterday’s sprint with several collisions at the start, everything went relatively clean today, although some race participants bumped into each other on the first lap, in particular Dennis Hauger and Ritomo Miata ended up off the track, but both stayed on the move, although they lost many positions.
Berman, who was leading the race, was unable to open a noticeable gap despite his best efforts, and Hadjar was about seven-tenths of a second behind the red and white Prema car, so he was able to use DRS, but he was in turn chased. van Duerksen. As in the sprint, the peloton was very close and only Andrea Kimi Antonelli, riding in 5th place, was over a second behind Bortoleto.
On the 7th lap the first mandatory pit stops started, in particular Hadjar, Durksen and Zane Maloney, the leader of the individual classification, went to the pits. Berman turned into the pit lane a lap later, but then another problem happened to him, of which the Brit has already had quite a few this year: during a pit stop, his car’s engine stalled. Prema’s mechanics were not immediately able to get it going again and it is clear that Oliver lost a lot of time, returning to the track as penultimate.
On the 9th lap, Antonelli also made a pit stop, after which he was in 6th place with Amaury Cordil leading the race, who was overtaking Pepe Marti. These two fought each other enthusiastically and did not plan to go to the pits yet – the hard tires allowed them to stay on the track for quite some time.
In any case, they did not claim high results, as their laps were noticeably slower than those who had already switched to soft tires.
When 13 laps down, the stewards’ decision was announced that Kush Maini was given 5 second penalties for a false start. While he was running fifth, he had not yet been in the pits and therefore had to serve a penalty at the pit stop, which left him no hope of a good result.
On lap 14, Maloney tried to attack Roman Stanek and take 13th position from the Czech Trident driver, but failed. In the next round Daan tried again, but again failed to overtake his opponent. With the top six not yet in the pits, this dispute was fundamental as both would be in the top ten.
Their duel continued round after round, but Stanek did not give up, and Maloney complained on the radio that his opponent, defending himself, swerved on the track and shifted while braking, which is prohibited by the rules. At the same time, Jack Crawford had almost overtaken the racer from the island of Barbados and was also preparing an attack. The Trident team encouraged Stanek via radio and advised him to continue actively defending the position, to provoke Maloney into aggressive actions, so that the opponent’s tires would wear out faster.
On the 20th lap what the Trident engineer told Roman Stanek happened: the tires of Zane Maloney’s car no longer held the track properly, which Crawford took advantage of and moved ahead of the Rodin Motorsport driver.
On the 23rd lap, Paul Aron, who is second in the individual rankings, overtook Franco Colapinto and started pushing the Argentinian, clearly preparing an attack. Both rode behind Antonelli, who still completed the top ten, the order of which inevitably changed when the six riders who were not yet there went to the pits.
Meanwhile, Crawford managed what Maloney could not: the American DAMA rider overtook Stanek, moved up to 13th position and immediately created a quite noticeable gap. And Maloney again began to try to stay ahead of the Czech, and again complaints flew over the radio that Stanek shifted gears while braking.
Only on the 30th lap did Juan Manuel Correa go to the pits, having fallen well beyond the top ten – it was clear that the same fate awaited all others who had not yet made the mandatory pit stop. On the next lap his example was followed by Cordil, who had been in the lead until that moment, but in the pits of the Invicta team the following happened: the Belgian turned out to have left too early, while the mechanics did not yet have time had. to secure the wheel so that it flew away immediately. It is good that no one was injured, but the race was over for Cordile and the stewards began to investigate this dangerous episode.
Now Isaac Hadjar was in the lead, but Bortoleto was literally three or four tenths behind and was already actively putting pressure on the Frenchman. But there were only two laps to go before the finish, and it was not a fact that Gabriel would have enough time to make a successful attack.
Hadjar skillfully defended himself, correctly positioned the car on the track, and nothing worked for the Brazilian, although he was literally on his opponent’s heels. In this order their cars crossed the finish line: Isaac won, making this the second achievement in Formula 2 for a Red Bull youth program driver.
Gabriel Bortoleto took 2nd place which he wasn’t too happy about, but Joshua Duerksen, who finished 3rd, was genuinely happy as he became the first driver from Paraguay to be on the podium in Formula 2.
Andrea Chimi Antonelli took 4th place, repeating his best result of the season so far, allowing him to rise straight from 10th place in the individual rankings to 6th, and the top five was completed by Franco Colapinto, the winner of yesterday’s sprint.
Although Zane Maloney did not score any points as he was content with 11th place, he remained at the top of the youth bracket, but Paul Aron, who finished sixth, closed the gap to five points. And Isaac Hadjar, who is still inferior to them, moved to third place (one – 27 points, the second – 14), but if things continue like this, the picture can quickly change.
The next stage takes place in Monaco in a week’s time, and Isaac may consider it his home race, where he will have the support of the fans, so he will certainly try to perform as well as he can.
Source: F1 News

I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.