F2: Richard Verschor wins the sprint at the Hungaroring

Saturday saw a blanket of clouds hanging over the Hungaroring, which meant that it was not as warm and the temperature of the track asphalt was generally much lower than yesterday. As a result, the conditions were significantly different compared to Formula 2 practice and qualifying, and the drivers had to adapt accordingly.

With the youth series having a partially reversed starting order, Trident driver Richard Vershor started from pole in the sprint, having set the 10th fastest time in qualifying. Alongside him on the front row was Kush Maini, who has not much less experience in F2, but it was even more interesting to see Zane Maloney, who is third in the personal standings, and Kimi Antonelli, who has been talked about so much lately.

The 17-year-old Italian, a protégé of Mercedes, is considered one of the brightest talents of the new generation of drivers, but in his debut season he has not yet made good on this progress: he has only one win to his name. and is still in 8th place in the championship. Of course, Kimi is very keen to improve his performance, so before the start of today’s race he was in a combative mood.

The surprises started even before the start, as Maloney simply couldn’t get going for the warm-up lap – it looked like there was a clutch failure, so Daan’s car was pushed into the pit lane, where he started.

Ferkhsor set off full of confidence, but Antonelli passed Maini beautifully in the first corners and set his sights on the race leader. At this stage of the race, Kimi had a slight advantage because he started on soft tyres, while the Dutchman Dallara had hard tyres. On lap 3, Kimi attacked, but Richard fought back, but the Italian was only three tenths behind his car.

On the radio he complained to the team that Ferskhor had moved into the braking zone, which is prohibited by the rules.

On the next lap Antonelli followed through and took the lead from the Trident driver by overtaking on the straight with DRS, after which he tried to create a gap. This was important because the soft tyres would start to lose performance sooner than the hard tyres and it would be difficult to maintain the lead.

After just a few laps, Kimi’s lead was over two seconds, especially since Ferschora had already overtaken Maini and it was necessary to provide the defense for the stubborn Indian Alpine Academy racer, whose career is managed by Mika Hakkinen.

On the seventh lap Enzo Fittipaldi made a daring move, ahead of Gabriel Bortoleto, and reached sixth position. But there was still a second and a half advantage over Dennis Hauger, who completed the top five.

At this point the stewards’ verdict was announced, who saw no violations of the rules in Ferskhor’s actions when he fended off Antonelli’s attacks.

In the 11th lap Hauger and Victor Martin started an interesting duel for the 4th position. Dennis actively put pressure on his opponent, used every opportunity to attack, but the Frenchman held on, although it sometimes seemed that Hauger had already taken the lead, but at the last moment Martin managed to accelerate and enter the next corner via a more favorable trajectory.

By lap 13, Antonelli’s lead had been reduced to just one second. On the one hand, this could be explained by the need to preserve the lifespan of the rubber, on the other hand, it seemed that the soft tyres were already starting to wear out.

With fifteen laps to go, Verschor was able to get within a second of the leader and the Dutchman immediately attacked. Kimi stopped the first attempt, but it was clear that it was not easy for him.

On the 16th lap Richard attacked the leader again, and this time Antonelli even locked the brakes, which obviously affected the state of the tires, but continued to drive forward.

But after another lap Ferskhor still took the lead at the end of the start-finish line. Kimi defended himself, but locked the wheels very hard, completely destroying the tires. He failed to stay on the road, and while he was coming out of the side of the road, Kush Maini also passed. And soon the Italian was ahead of Martin, Fittipaldi and Hauger – it became clear that a pit stop was indispensable.

Therefore, Antonelli went to the pits, ending his hopes of a good result. Let us remind you that pit stops in the sprint are not mandatory, but sometimes circumstances arise that simply force drivers to change tires. However, he was not the only one who had to go for the next set of tires: Bortoleto also went to the pits.

By lap 21, Isaac Hadjar, the leader of the individual classification, who started eighth, had already reached the top five, ahead of Hauger, and on the next lap he overtook Fittipaldi. And he did it beautifully, along the outer radius.

Dennis tried to take advantage of the situation and attacked the Brazilian as well, but Enzo held his position. After another lap, however, the Norwegian broke his resistance and took the lead, while the bearer of the famous racing name locked the brakes and drove off the track. But unfortunately this was not in vain: the left front tire was punctured and he slowly returned to the pits.

Meanwhile, Paul Aron, who occupies second place in the individual ranking and started 10th, was already riding seventh. He managed to stay ahead of Taylor Barnard, which was important, because at the end of the sprint only the first eight get points.

But behind her, no less interesting events took place. For the 9th place, there was a dispute between three riders: between Juan Manuel Correa, Jake Crawford and Oliver Berman. They literally entered the corners at the same time, their cars in a row, although it was clear that, for example, in the third corner there was simply no room for all three. As a result, all three ended up outside the track, but they were lucky, everyone returned to the track without any problems. True, Berman was less lucky – he was the last in this trio, i.e. 11th

However, Correa also failed to score any points because the race was over. As we predicted the day before, Richard Ferschor did not miss his chance, rode today’s race with confidence and took his first victory of the season. Formally, this is also his first podium in 2024, so his joy and the joy of the Trident team are understandable. It is worth recalling that he had already won once on track, and that was at the beginning of the season in Jeddah, but then he lost it because he was disqualified.

Kush Maini finished second, with third place going to Victor Martin, who was also unlucky this year, but today he reached the podium – this is his second top three finish, the first being a month ago in Barcelona.

Since finishing fourth, Hadjar has extended his lead in the individual standings over Paul Aron by three points, while the Estonian finished 7th in the sprint. The difference between them is this: the Frenchman now has 138 points, his opponent 121, but in the main race of the weekend Paul will start from pole, so the balance of power could change tomorrow.

The results are being prepared…