F2 - Pirelli Grosser Preis der Steiermark: Event Analysis
Qualifying:
After a diabolical weekend for both himself and Carlin last weekend, Red Bull junior and F2 rookie Yuki Tsunoda took his maiden F2 pole for the Styrian Grand Prix Feature Race, with the UNI-Virtuosis following with Guanyu Zhou beating championship leader Callum Ilott. The top 3 were covered by just 85 thousandths of a second.
Zhou will be looking to make amends for a disastrous Austrian Grand Prix weekend, after suffering issues in both the Feature and Sprint Race, meaning his only points were scored from the pole he won this time a week ago. In contrast, his teammate Ilott is leading the championship, and will be looking to increase that lead with a good race starting in P3.
Hitech’s Luca Ghiotto also had a weekend to forget last week, but looks to make up for it after qualifying in P4 in Hitech’s second ever F2 weekend. Likewise 2019 title protagonist Jack Aitken had an underwhelming start to his 2020 season, but qualifies in P5.
After 0 points for Carlin, they have 1 driver on pole and one in 7th for the Styrian Feature Race, with standout Felipe Drugovich rounding out the top 10, and once again beating his experienced teammate Nobuharu Matsushita.
Trident struggled last week, with just 1 point scored by Roy Nissany, however an impressive outing from Marino Sato saw him qualify 11th, with Nissany close behind in 13th. However a disappointing showing from DAMS and Charouz see them line up P15/16 and P17/18 respectively.
Both Charouz drivers, Louis Deletraz and Pedro Piquet, will also take a 1-place grid penalty after illegally driving from the paddock to the pitlane on wet-weather tyres.
Feature Race:
On Saturday, the heavens opened above the Red Bull Ring, with the race starting under the Safety Car. After a few laps however, race control deemed the conditions too dangerous and red flagged the race for over an hour. Eventually however, the race got underway.
The single file rolling start meant pole sitter Tsunoda lead into the first corner, however Jack Aitken wasted no time in getting past Hitech’s Luca Ghiotto into the Turn 1.
ART’s Christian Lundgaard was excelling in the wet, and was picking his way through the pack. On Lap 6, he overtook 2019 FIA F3 champion Robert Schwartzman and a lap later sailed past Ghiotto around the outside of Turn 6. Schwartzman would eventually follow suite and pass Ghiotto for P6.
Lundgaard’s charge continued, passing Aitken for P4 on Lap 15 at Turn 7. The battles in the top 10 continued throughout the race, with Shwartzman passing Callum Ilott and Lundgaard repassing Aitken after the pitstops.
Meanwhile, Red Bull Junior Yuki Tsunoda was dominating, but this was all about to unravel. A radio issue meant the Japaneseman couldn’t hear the team’s call for him to box, meaning he was left out on dying wet tyres for many laps longer than optimal.
Eventually he saw the pit boards telling him to box, but the damage was done. Guanyu Zhou and Schwartzman both jumped Tsunoda for the lead, before battling it out on Lap 27, the Prema driver performing a beautiful switchback on the Virtuosi driver for the race lead at Turn 4.
Tsunoda wasn’t going to let the win slip away however, and he began his charge with 9 laps to go, passing Ilott for P3, before heading on to pass Zhou into Turn 1 a few laps later.
But despite a valiant effort, Tsunoda was denied his maiden F2 victory, with Schwartzman beating him to the line to take his maiden F2 victory instead, and dedicating the win to his late father, who died this year.
The full results of the Feature Race are as follows:
Sprint Race:
Sunday’s Sprint Race was a much drier affair than the Feature Race, however that didn’t make it any less interesting. Ticktum and Armstrong shared the front row, but it was Lundgaard who mad e the jump from 3rd to 2nd at Turn 1, who then challenged Ticktum into Turn 3. This brought Armstrong back into the fight and the ART’s battled it out over P2, with Schumacher lurking behind ready to pounce at any mistake.
The Virtuosis of Zhou and Ilott were also side-by-side once again, but their battle was cut short by a VSC for Feature Race winner Schwartzman, who span out of the race at Turn 1.
It only took until Lap 4 for Lundgaard to dive up the inside of Ticktum into Turn 3. Ticktum challenged him back into Turn 4 around the outside but wasn’t able to take the lead back from the Renault junior.
Feature Race runner up Yuki Tsunoda then hit issues of his own, with a mechanical failure on Lap 10.
Mick Schumacher then launched his bit for the podium a couple of laps later against Armstrong, making the move into Turn 4 with the classic Schumacher squeeze. However just 1 lap later and Schumacher would be forced into retirement after the fire extinguisher goes off in the cockpit.
Onto the penultimate lap, and once again the Virtuosi teammates were battling it out, this time for P4, however Zhou was able to fend off his British teammate Ilott.
Nothing could stop ART’s Lundgaard however, who took his maiden Formula 2 win in just his 4th race ahead of Dan Ticktum, with Marcus Armstrong making it a double podium finish for ART.
The full results of the Sprint Race are as follows:
Despite his DNF, Shwartzman continues to lead the championship, but by a significantly reduced amount, with both Ilott and Lundgaard now less than 10 points behind him. Lundgaard also makes it 4 winners from 4 teams in 4 races in F2 2020.
The full Drivers' and Constructor's Championship standings can be viewed below:
Formula 2 returns next week at the 2020 Aramco Magyar Nagydíj, at the Hungaroring.
