#ghiotto

ILOTT BREAKS HIS DUCK

Callum Ilott saw off challenges from Guanyu Zhou and Mick Schumacher to fight his way to his first ever Feature Race victory in F2.

An entertaining race saw drama before the start, with Luca Ghiotto breaking down on track before the start, and Marino Sato stalling on the grid and failing to make the start, continuing his nightmare weekend.

Ilott was the quickest driver when the lights went out, jumping both Zhou and Felipe Drugovich to take the lead into turn one, only for Zhou to storm back around the outside through turns seven and eight.

Guiliano Alesi and Nobuharu Matsushita also had lively first laps, gaining 8 and 7 places respectively, whilst Yuki Tsunoda steamed into the back of his Carlin team mate Jehan Daruvala at turn 3, sending both cars to the back of the pack and giving the Japanese driver a time penalty.

Tsunoda then had to pit for a front wing change and stalled in the pits, sending his afternoon from bad to worse. Lap 7 saw Sean Gelael retire, and Marcus Armstrong pull off a brilliant undercut strategy to pit first from the front runners, a move that saw him jump up to fourth at the end of the first round of pit stops.

Lap 12 saw slow pit stops for both Nikita Mazepin and Louis Deletraz,sending them both tumbling down the order early on. With race leader Zhou pitting on lap 18, Ilott on lap 19 and Schumacher on lap 20, Ilott initially jumping Zhou and Schumacher jumping both Uni-Virtuosi cars to take the lead of the race.

Zhou then retook P2 with an aggressive move on his team mate at turn 3, and a lap later retook the lead from Mick Schumacher, with Ilott following past on lap 23, after making contact with the German.

The Renault Junior remained in the lead until lap 26 when he slowed with a technical issue dropping him all the way down the order, gifting the lead to his team mate, who didn’t look back. Lap 27 saw Artem Markelov also retire shortly after making his pit stop and bringing out the safety car. Zhou got going again behind the Safety Car, albeit miles from a finish in the points or the podium. 

Lap 31 saw racing resume and Mick Schumacher blew his chance of victory by running off in to the gravel through turn 7 and 8 dropping him all the way down to P13, leaving F3 graduates Marcus Armstrong and Robert Shwartzman in P2 and P3 as Ilott disappeared into the distance.

Armstrong defended bravely from Shwarztman until the flag as Ilott stretched his advantage to 8 seconds out in front, whilst fellow Brit Dan Ticktum hunted down Christian Lundgaard for P4, but the Dane held on despite a last lap lunge. Frenchman Guiliano Alesi in the HWA also starred, moving up from a 17th place start to take 6th place at the flag.

RACE RESULT:

1. ILOTT 2. ARMSTRONG 3. SHWARTZMAN 4. LUNDGAARD 5. TICKTUM 6. ALESI 7. DELETRAZ 8. DRUGOVICH 9. MATSUSHITA 10. NISSANY

We interrupt regular programming to bring you this picture of Team Russian Time’s Luca Ghiotto.