Andrea Kimi Antonelli broke his jinx to win sprint FIA F2 race in Britain, as Arvid Lindblad made it three F3 wins in a row.
F2:
After a Formation Lap behind the Safety Car, racing got underway with a rolling start with heavier rain closing in quickly. Antonelli retained his lead, but teammate Oliver Bearman was battling Gabriel Bortoleto in the opening corners and the pair made slight contact, leaving the Briton with a broken front wing endplate in the fight for fifth.
Bortoleto was undeterred and rounded Jak Crawford on the outside of Copse and into Maggotts with a brave move for P4. Torrential rain arrived to close out the first lap as Antonelli built up a 2.5s lead over Maloney in second. With damage to his front wing, Bearman dropped down the order, losing places to Franco Colapinto, Dennis Hauger and Victor Martins in the space of half a lap, falling to ninth as a result.
A Virtual Safety Car was deployed on Lap 3 to recover the endplate of Bearman. As racing resumed, Paul Aron caught his title rival napping to secure P10 from Isack Hadjar on the approach to Maggotts and Becketts. Zak O’Sullivan relegated the Frenchman to 12th into Abbey at the end of the lap, before Hadjar then ran off the road at Turn 1, losing two more spots to teammate Josep María Martí and Ritomo Miyata, putting him 14th.
The Safety Car was deployed on Lap 4 but with rain increasing, the Red Flag was then thrown. After a brief pause in action to allow the rain to ease off, racing resumed entering Lap 7 with another rolling start and once again, Antonelli kept hold of the lead. Martins had a great restart to move up to sixth with passes on both MP Motorsport drivers in the opening sector.
On Lap 8, contact between Martí and Championship leader Aron left both out of the race, while in a separate incident, Hadjar found himself in the gravel following a spin at Copse that put him on the sidelines also. Those events brought out another Safety Car. Racing got back underway on Lap 13 with Antonelli leading comfortably once more while Bearman made a pass on Hauger at Turn 4 to secure eighth. Colapinto then moved ahead of Hauger into Brooklands and cleared Bearman after the Briton ran through the gravel at Copse, dropping him to 18th.
O’Sullivan was on the move next on Lap 14, rounding Colapinto on the outside of Copse for seventh position to continue his charge through the pack. Onto Lap 16 and the Briton was attacking his teammate but contact between the pair at The Loop left Martins spinning and O’Sullivan with damage, putting both out of the race. Meanwhile, Bearman pulled to the side of the circuit on the Hangar Straight to bring out another Virtual Safety Car.
Back to racing conditions, Roman Stanek had been hustling Miyata for eighth and the Trident driver secured P8 from the Rodin driver with three laps to go. Heading into the penultimate lap, Colapinto looked to have cleared Crawford for fifth around the outside of Stowe, but the DAMS Lucas Oil driver fought back into Abbey to retake the spot. Onto the final lap and the all-Invicta battle for the last spot on the podium could hardly be split, the pair almost colliding several times on a frantic final tour.
Up ahead though, Antonelli was uncatchable, and the Italian won his first F2 race by over eight seconds to Zane Maloney in second. Into the final three corners and the Invictas went wheel-to-wheel, with Bortoleto taking the final podium spot in a drag race to the line by 0.3s from Maini. Colapinto secured fifth with a final lap pass on Crawford, while Hauger and Stanek rounded out the points in seventh and eighth places respectively.
Result: https://x.com/MsportXtra/status/1809578643116478968
UPDATE: Following the conclusion of the FIA Formula 2 Sprint Race in Silverstone, two drivers have been handed post-race penalties. Firstly, Invicta Racing’s Gabriel Bortoleto has received a time penalty for overtaking off the track and gaining a lasting advantage. On the final lap, the Brazilian made an overtake on Kush Maini at Turn 16 to take third position at the chequered flag.
After a post-race investigation into the manoeuvre, hearing from both drivers and team representatives along with examining all available video evidence, the Race Stewards determined that Bortoleto had completed the overtake off track. As a result, Bortoleto was assigned a five-second time penalty. The decision drops Bortoleto to fourth and promotes Maini to third.
Finally, Zak O’Sullivan has received a grid penalty following his contact with ART Grand Prix’s Victor Martins. During the race, O’Sullivan and Martins came together at Turn 4 fighting for position, leading to both drivers retiring from the race.
After hearing from both drivers and team representatives as well as examining all available video evidence, the Race Stewards determined that O’Sullivan had been wholly responsible for the contact. As a result, the Stewards elected to hand the British driver a five-place grid penalty. The ART driver will serve the penalty at the next race in which he participates.
F3:
It was a great start for Lindblad, as the PREMA driver won out in a three-way battle with pole-sitter León and Zagazeta heading into Turn 1 to take the lead. Zagazeta initially got ahead of León, but the Van Amersfoort Racing driver fought back through at Maggotts and Becketts to move up to P2. The Jenzer Motorsport rookie then came under attack from Christian Mansell heading into Stowe but managed to stay ahead.
Mansell though then lost a position on Lap 3 as Rodin Motorsport’s Callum Voisin was showing strong pace to move past the ART Grand Prix driver for fourth at the entry to Luffield. The Virtual Safety Car was needed moments later after Santiago Ramos suffered a puncture following a slight collision with Tommy Smith, with a piece of his tyre needing to be cleared from the racing line near Copse.
The action resumed on Lap 5, but the Safety Car was almost immediately deployed after Max Esterson and Oliver Goethe collided on the entry to Copse, sending both through the gravel and into the barrier. Both drivers walked away from the incident, and we were back underway at the end of Lap 7, however there was another collision as Tim Tramnitz and Luke Browning made contact going through the Loop.
Tramnitz came in with a damaged front wing while Browning swapped tyres after sustaining a puncture. Both were able to come back out and continue albeit one lap down and at the back of the field. Tramnitz’s MP Motorsport teammate Alexander Dunne was on the move and got ahead of Charlie Wurz for P6 going down the inside at Stowe, before making his way past Mansell for fifth on Lap 11.
Onto the next lap, and Dunne had dropped back behind Mansell and Wurz to seventh and was looking to retake the position from the Jenzer rookie, but they collided on the Wellington Straight. The Virtual Safety Car was deployed with Wurz’s car parked on the grass, while Dunne came into the pitlane for a front wing change. He continued but came out at the back of the field.
Racing resumed on Lap 14 with Lindblad two and a half seconds clear of León in the lead. Having resisted an earlier attack from Voisin, Zagazeta was now outside DRS range of the British driver. Just behind in the battle for fifth, a DRS train had formed behind Mansell which included his ART teammate Nikola Tsolov, Gabriele Minì, Sami Meguetounif and Sebastián Montoya.
Montoya though, having started P17, was on a mission and dived down the inside of Meguetounif for P8 at Turn 3. Onto the final lap, and Lindblad was now well over six seconds clear out in front as he crossed the line to win on home soil. León finished in second while Zagazeta achieved his first Formula 3 podium by finishing third.
Voisin was the next best placed British driver in fourth, while Mansell crossed the line in fifth but dropped down to P11 after exceeding track limits one too many times. This promoted Tsolov up to P5 ahead of Minì in sixth and Montoya in seventh. Meguetounif finished in eighth ahead of Laurens van Hoepen and his Trident teammate Leonardo Fornaroli.
Result: https://www.fiaformula3.com/Results?raceid=1055
UPDATE: Following the conclusion of the FIA Formula 3 Sprint Race at Silverstone, three drivers have been assigned post-race penalties. Firstly, James Wharton has been assigned a 10-second time penalty for causing a collision. During the race, the Hitech Pulse-Eight driver made contact with Van Amersfoort Racing’s Tommy Smith at Turn 3.
After a post-race investigation, hearing from team representatives along with the drivers as well as examination of video evidence, the Race Stewards determined that Car #15 had been wholly responsible for the collision. As a result, Wharton drops from 13th to 18th in the final results. Secondly, Jenzer Motorsport’s Charlie Wurz has received a time penalty.
On Lap 12, Wurz and MP Motorsport’s Alex Dunne collided on the Wellington Straight that left the former out of the race and Dunne with front wing damage. Following the race, the Race Stewards heard from both drivers along with team representatives and examining all available video evidence, they determined that Wurz was wholly responsible for the incident.
Due to the Jenzer driver’s retirement from the race, the 10-second time penalty has been converted into a five-place grid penalty to be served in the next race he participates in. Finally, Oliver Goethe has had his 10-second time penalty converted into a grid drop. The Campos Racing driver collided with Jenzer Motorsport’s Max Esterson at Turn 9, resulting in both driver’s retirement from the race.
Goethe was determined to be the party wholly at fault for the collision and was assigned a time penalty as a result. With the Campos Racing driver unable to serve the 10-second time penalty in race, it has been converted into a five-place grid drop set to be served at the next race in which he participates.
[Note: The story is as per press release]
