Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd & FV8 3.5

Ralph Boschung debuted in F2 in 2017 but only recently claimed his first victory – in his 96th race in the championship. Who else has had to wait a long time to win in single-seater racing’s second tier series?

Campos Racing’s veteran driver Ralph Boschung sits atop the Formula 2 standings after four races, and goes into this weekend’s new event in Melbourne full of confidence after years of unfulfilled potential, budget issues and injury.

He has been in the series since 2017, making his debut before IndyCar podium-finisher Christian Lundgaard, Super Formula sophomore Ren Sato and series rookies Kakunoshin Ohta and Cem Bolukbasi had even started their car racing careers.

In recent years, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, F2 has packed more races into its schedule while Indy Nxt has shrunk its calendar, and the amount of race starts a driver gets in an F2 season now is 10 more than what drivers in Formula V8 3.5 (nee Formula Renault 3.5) had just six years ago. It’s also not far from being three times the amount that GP2 and F2 predecessor International Formula 3000 featured two decades ago.

That means it would now take less than two seasons to rack up 50 F2 starts, and at present only 35 drivers since the 1960s have stayed that long in the second tier of single-seaters without winning a race. So who in the past has had to wait that long to win, and did that stop them from making it to the top?

Giacomo Ricci did eight races in World Series by Nissan in 2004 before a kind of side-step to Euroseries 3000, a series which used old F3000 cars and later became known as Auto GP. While the cars were second-tier machinery, drivers treated the series as a step before competing in the modern cars of GP2 and FR3.5 and so none of Auto GP’s seasons have been included in Formula Scout’s calculations.

After winning that series in 2006, Ricci didn’t have the budget for GP2 so headed to the United States and via a shootout got a seat in Atlantics, a then-rival to the USA’s other second-tier series Indy Nxt. But things started to go wrong behind the scenes, which he explained in an interview with Formula Scout about his career, and through an old friend eventually ended up in GP2.

Photo: GP2 Media Service / LAT Images

The David Price Racing team he drove for rarely challenged the top 10, and Ricci only had the budget for part-seasons, but when DPR relocated to Italy it became far more competitive. Ricci ended his second GP2 Asia season with a win on his 50th start at that level [pictured above], then did the same in the main series later in 2010. He’s now Trident’s team manager in F2.

Also having to wait a half-century for success was Felipe Nasr, who was competitive from the off but never quite made it to the front. He made the podium 20 times in three seasons, took until his 37th start to lead a race, and was fourth in the standings as a sophomore despite not winning. During his third season he won four times and led 128 laps, earning him an F1 seat with Sauber for the next two years.

Christian Danner raced in European F2 from 1981 to ’84 and made the podium seven times in 47 races to twice come fifth in the standings. Victory was elusive in his March cars, despite being a factory driver of the marque for two years, but when he stuck with one of their chassis for European F2’s successor Int. F3000 in 1985 it proved a rewarding choice as it only took five races to win. That breakthrough win came in the Pau Grand Prix, and three more wins followed to make Danner champion.

F1 then beckoned, but he failed to make an impact in 35 starts there and returned to the second tier in 1990 to race for Leyton House in Japanese F3000. He made the podium in his season there, then spent several years bit-part in IndyCar.

There are three drivers who took 53 starts to win, and the most significant of these is Pierre Gasly. After winning the 2013 FR Eurocup title, Gasly was added to the Red Bull Junior Team and went 1015 days without winning a race. He retained Red Bull’s support though that trying time as he was actually performing very strongly.

His Eurocup title earned him a seat in FR3.5 where he was championship runner-up as a rookie, making the podium in almost half of the races, and he then moved across to GP2 where his rookie season was also impressive with three poles in the last four rounds and four podiums. But he was only eighth in the points, and so a second season in GP2 then made sense to do.

With new team Prema, Gasly edged team-mate Antonio Giovinazzi to the 2016 title and picked up four wins on the way. However it was still not enough to convince Red Bull to put him in F1, and he instead picked up top-tier experience in Formula E and Super Formula. In the latter he came incredibly close to becoming champion as a rookie, forcing Red Bull’s hand to finally give him an F1 shot. He’s now a grand prix winner and has finally left Red Bull’s ranks to race for Alpine.

Like several others on this list, Gasly also contested a GP2 race that is considered a non-championship affair and so is not included in statistics for driver starts. Gasly was in fact the cause of this statistical discrepancy, as a spin after two corners in the 2015 season finale at Yas Marina Circuit led to a multi-car crash, the race being immediately stopped and then being declared void as barriers could not be repaired in time for a restart and less than a lap had been completed.

During the days of GP2 Asia, sometimes the quality of the field was lower than in the main series and it enabled drivers to pick up results they wouldn’t have managed against tougher opposition on European tracks. Roldan Rodriguez was one example, a driver who was an irregular scorer until joining Piquet GP for the 2008-09 GP2 Asia season. He started the campaign off with victory from pole at Shanghai, and came third in the standings with an average finishing position of 10.7.

Takao Wada debuted in Japanese F2 in 1977, made the podium on his sixth start in 1979, but did not finish in the top three again until the 1986 season opener. It then wasn’t until 1988, once the series had become Japanese F3000, that he claimed the first of two career wins. He retired from the series in 1993, having appeared in 90 races.

Only Max Verstappen has raced at the top level of single-seaters at a younger age than Josef Kral, who aged 17 and having raced in nothing higher than Formula BMW got an A1GP call-up for Team Czech Republic.

After that he did more learning with two seasons in International Formula Master, winning three races, then took on GP2. Points were rare, and he bowed out after three years with victory on his 58th and final second-tier start. He’s since raced GTs.

Photo: GP2 Media Service

Marco Apicella had a 52-race career in Int. F3000, of which two poles and 10 podiums were the highlights. But victory in his five years there were elusive and he switched to Japanese F3000 for 1992. It only took six races for him to become a winner, he won again the next year and made his F1 debut with Jordan. That race lasted less than a kilometre, but he returned to Japan and became champion in 1994. Unfortunately he then scored no points in his title defence the year after.

One of few women to win at this level, Pippa Mann scored three times in two FR3.5 seasons, then only made the top 10 three times in her rookie Indy Nxt campaign in 2009. But switching to Sam Schmidt Motorsports for her sophomore season unlocked more pace, and she followed up pole position for the iconic Freedom 100 oval race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway with two more poles, a win and a second place in the last three rounds to rise from 11th to fifth in the standings.

She made her IndyCar debut the following year, and seven of her 17 starts in the series have been in the Indianapolis 500.

10. Arie Luydenyk Jr THE NETHERLANDS/USA 62 races
Indy Lights (66 races): 1 win, 3 poles, 13 podiums, 1729pts   Top tier IndyCar (1 race)

Photo: IndyCar Series

Far more famous for his appearances on American dating shows than for his racing accomplishments, Luydenyk is the son of a two-time Indy 500 winner. He did make it to the Indy 500 in his own career, but never hit the highs his father did.

Luyendyk Jr’s Indy Nxt debut came in 2002, after two seasons in the fourth-tier USF2000 series and a handful of Formula Ford races in Europe. Making such a jump meant results were not to be expected straight away, but he exceeded expectations driving for his father’s own team with four second places and a pole to finish his rookie season as runner-up.

But such results became harder to achieve with each of the teams Luyendyk subsequently drove for. Two podiums and two poles in 2003 put him seventh in the standings, then he was third in 2004 with a further two podiums.

As the series moved away from having an oval-dominated calendar, Luydendyk became less competitive against drivers who were stepping up from series populated by road and street courses. He went 27 races and four years without a podium, before recapturing some of his old form in 2008. That season ended at Chicagoland Speedway, and with a first win for Luyendyk. After a few more Indy Nxt starts in 2010, the world of The Bachelorette beckoned.

=8. Fairuz Fauzy MALAYSIA 65 races
GP2 (62 races): 5pts   GP2 Asia (14 races): 1 win, 3 podiums, 25pts   FR3.5 (57 races): 1 win, 2 poles, 10 podiums, 181pts   Top tier A1GP (22 races): 1 win, 2 podiums, 57pts

Photo: GP2 Media Service

Much of Fauzy’s racing career has been intrinsicly linked to his home country, driving for Malaysian teams in various series.

A combination of a period of financial propserity in the nation, the timing of having multiple Malaysian-owned firms active in F1 including Lotus, and a handful of top results in competitive championships doing enough to dampen the pay driver label he would otherwise have meant Fauzy was a contender to race in F1 during the early 2010s.

He never made it, and it was never quite clear whether he was F1-ready based on his junior series results alone. And Lotus certainly didn’t believe he was after a year of testing as they prematurely released him from a five-year contract.

Fauzy debuted in GP2 in 2005, stepping up after taking one podium from 70 races in British Formula 3. He scored no points in his first two GP2 seasons, and in the meantime made his top-level debut for Team Malaysia in A1GP.

For 2007 he switched to FR3.5, and looked far more competitive with three podiums and a pole position. Fauzy then returned to A1GP duties alongside a season in GP2 Asia. At the infamous Sentul round, where changing weather and a deteriorating track surface required teams to equip cars with protective devices for wings, Fauzy earned his first win from reversed-grid pole in the sprint race.

After his A1GP duties concluded he came in late to the 2008 FR3.5 season, but made the podium in Monaco in his comeback race. There was only one points finish in the 12 races that followed, but then when Fauzy returned to A1GP – and now in a full-time capacity – he looked a significantly improved driver and started the season with victory and a second place.

Fauzy chose FR3.5 for his main programme again in 2009, and in the first four rounds only once finished higher than seventh. That result was a win from pole at the Hungaroring though, and consistent scoring and a few more podiums thereon led to him winning a five-way fight to be championship runner-up.

Following his year of auditioning for a Lotus F1 drive, Fauzy returned to all three of the second-tier series he had previously raced in but had patchy form that made it even more inconclusive about what his level was as a driver.

=8. Masahiko Kageyama JAPAN 65 races
Japanese F3000/FNippon (73 races): 2 wins, 2 poles, 8 podiums, 56pts   Top tier FNippon (19 races): 1pt

Photo: Demodori6

While the series that is now known as Super Formula has always been at the top level of Japan’s single-seater scene, for several decades it ran to F2 and then F3000 rules before joining F1 and IndyCar as a top-tier series in 1999.

Kageyama raced there from 1990 to 2001, and his two wins came in what was Formula Nippon’s final year as a junior series.

Success only arrived once he joined Team Impul for the 1997 season, having already become Japanese Touring Car champion with the team four years prior.

Three podiums and 16 points put Kageyama seventh in the ’97 standings, and he started 1998 with victory at Suzuka. He earned his first FNippon pole at the same track four races later, and converted that into a second career win, with his only other point that season coming in the final race which was also held at Suzuka. It was still enough to put him fourth in the standings, two positions behind his younger brother Masami.

Whenever the older Kageyama swapped single-seaters for cars with a roof he was more success-prone, winning two titles in the series that preceded Super GT and also coming third in the Le Mans 24 Hours for Nissan.

7. Nicholas Latifi CANADA 66 races
FR3.5 (23 races): 1 podium, 75pts   GP2/F2 (98 races): 6 wins, 21 podiums, 506pts   Top tier F1 (61 races): 9pts

Photo: LAT Images

In addition to the ‘non-championship’ Abu Dhabi race, Latifi’s career in the second tier also includes the infamous F2 race at Spa-Francorchamps in 2019 which Anthoine Hubert lost his life in and has also been scrubbed from the series’ stats books.

Latifi’s journey into motorsport meant he started competing seriously at a far later age than his peers, and learned much of the intricacies of driving from paper and theory-based work. But with a father who provided the funding to make up for any lost ground at each step of the motorsport ladder, he couldn’t rely on a late start as an excuse by the time he reached FR3.5.

• Feature: Why Nicholas Latifi’s rise to F1 is more remarkable than you think

A podium on his sixth FR3.5 start there proved to be a false dawn, and after a full season there he switched to GP2. There was a 27-race wait for his next podium, achieved in the 2016 GP2 season opener, then another 25-race wait for a follow-up to that.

But the continuity of staying with DAMS, who he ultimately spent four seasons driving for, helped Latifi continually improve and he finally claimed his first win in F2’s Silverstone sprint race in 2017. Nine podiums from 21 races that season put Latifi an impressive fifth in the standings.

In 2018 he and the team suffered a setback with the introduction of F2’s new car, but had got on top of it the season after and Latifi started 2019 by winning three of the first five races. Despite becoming championship runner-up behind Nyck de Vries, Latifi was firmly considered a pay driver when he stepped up to F1 with Williams in 2020.

6. Max Chilton ENGLAND 70 races
FR3.5 (1 race)   GP2 (62 races): 2 wins, 2 poles, 4 podiums, 176pts   GP2 Asia (12 races): 2pts   GP2 Final (2 races)   Indy Nxt (13 races): 1 win, 3 poles, 6 podiums, 258 pts   Top tier F1 (35 races)   IndyCar (83 races): 1351pts

Photo: Indianapolis Motor Speedway, LLC Photography

Another driver whose father paved the way to the top via some large-scale financial investments in their son’s career, Chilton is also the younger brother of former British Touring Car star Tom Chilton.

In 2009 the younger Chilton came fourth in British F3 with Carlin, a team his father became majority shareholder of and thereon became a maintay in Chilton’s career.

Although he first raced in GP2 with Ocean Racing Technology, once Carlin arrived in the series in 2011 he was back in their line-up and he came 20th in the standings that year. A singular fifth place was Chilton’s best result after 53 races in the second tier of single-seaters, but he and the team made a big jump up the order as 2012 began.

Chilton started the season with his first podium, and in round nine at the Hungaroring he won the feature race from pole. A further pole and another feature race win meant he came fourth in the points, and with the Marussia F1 team sponsoring Carlin through 2012 it was no surprise that Chilton then stepped up to F1 with Russian-owned manufacturer.

He lost his seat after two seasons, and returned to Carlin which was now competing in Indy Nxt. Doing an incomplete campaign prevented a title challenge, but Chilton was competitive in his outings – taking a win and three poles –  and did enough to earn an IndyCar seat for 2016. After two seasons and one top-five finish with Chip Ganassi Racing, he left the team to once again reunite with Carlin and lead their entry into IndyCar.

=4. Rio Haryanto INDONESIA 72 races
GP2 Final (2 races)   GP2 (89 races): 3 wins, 7 podiiums, 226pts   Top tier F1 (12 races)

Photo: Manor Racing

After winning the 2009 FBMW Pacific title, Haryanto became a junior of F1’s new Virgin Racing team and enter GP3 with the linked Manor Racing outfit. He won on his fourth start and as the team’s highest placed driver in the standings got a prize F1 test at the end of 2010.

Haryanto only scored five times in his sophomore GP3 season with the team, although took two wins and two further podiums, and was similarly inconsistent through his GP2 career.

After debuting in the single-event GP2 Final at the end of 2011, Haryanto made the full-time move to GP2 alongside Chilton in the Marussia-backed Carlin (with Marussia succeeding Virgin in ownership of the F1 team).

• Feature: The man to call when looking for F1’s next Asian driver

The highlight of his rookie season was pole in the wet at Spa, but his best race result was a fifth place, and moving to the Addax team for 2013 brought a first podium but less points and also a departure from Marussia’s ranks.

Signing with Caterham’s GP2 team in 2014 didn’t bring him into F1 contention with that brand, and the results were lacking again. Everything changed for Haryanto the year when he joined Campos Racing, instantly becoming a victory threat.

The long-awaited first win came in the sprint race of round one at Bahrain, and two more sprint race wins followed. Haryanto was the only driver of that year’s GP2 crop to land a full-time F1 drive for 2016, reuniting with Manor in the process, but budget issues meant he only lasted 12 races before losing his seat.

=4. Jerome d’Ambrosio BELGIUM 72 races
FR3.5 (7 races)   GP2 (58 races): 1 win, 1 pole, 7 podiums, 71pts   GP2 Asia (21 races): 6 podiums, 48pts   Top tier F1 (20 races)   FE (69 races): 3 wins, 2 poles, 9 podiums, 322pts

Photo: GP2 Media Service

D’Ambrosio has come a long way since his GP2 days, which were notable for a rare instance of a driver in a junior series losing their seat based on a lack of results (for one weekend only).

The Belgian’s first second-tier starts came in FR3.5 in 2006, contesting four rounds before switching to Euroseries 3000. He stepped down to Int. FMaster for 2007, and became champion, then headed to GP2 with DAMS.

Two podiums in the Asian series was an encouraging start for d’Ambrosio, and after a slow start in the main series he was runner-up in two sprint races in the final three rounds. That momentum continued into GP2 Asia over the winter of 2008-09, where he was championship runner-up with a pole and four podiums, and then he started the 2009 season with three podiums in the first four races. Nine points-free races followed, then three fourth places lifted him to ninth in the standings.

The Gravity Sport Management organisation that looked after d’Ambrosio’s career was heavily involved in the Renault F1 team at the time, and he was made one of its reserve drivers for 2010. Gravity also orchestrated a deal for d’Ambrosio to become a free practice driver for Virgin later in the year, but also pulled him out of his GP2 seat during the season for underperforming.

D’Ambrosio had actually broken his victory duck in the Monaco sprint race, but failed to score after that and Romain Grosjean was called up to replace him at Hockenheim. Once he returned to his seat, d’Ambrosio qualified on pole at Spa, made the podium at Monza and earned an F1 seat with Virgin for 2011.

He lasted one year racing in F1 before returning to his reserve role at Renault, now known as Lotus, and then raced in FE for six seasons. D’Ambrosio won three E-Prix, and his experience earned him a management role at Venturi after he stopped driving. He left the team and the series last year, and recently was signed by Mercedes to head up its F1 junior team.

3. Stephane Richelmi MONACO 73 races
FR3.5 (17 races): 6pts   GP2 (70 races): 1 win, 2 poles, 4 podiums, 201pts   GP2 Final (2 races)

Photo: Sam Bloxham/GP2 Series Media Service

The son of French Gravel Rally champion Jean-Pierre Richelmi had a single-seater career that was light on wins at every level he competed at.

He went through three years of FR1.6 and FR2.0 without a victory, but in Italian F3 won four times en route to second in the standings in 2010. From there he stepped up to FR3.5, scoring once in his rookie season, then moved to GP2 at the end of 2011.

It took 13 races to score his first points, and six races later he claimed his first podium in remarkable fashion at Hockenheim from 22nd on the grid. He made up eight places on lap six of the race, then another 10 places a lap later to move into second as he had gambled on starting using slick tyres on a drying track. Following his compulsory pitstop he dropped to fifth, but made it back to third in an inspired drive.

It was a one-off though, with Richelmi not featuring near the front again until 11 months later when he was second at Silverstone in the feature race. He was on pole next time out at the Nurburgring, but there was another long wait for further success.

DAMS was the team to beat in 2014, and Richelmi reaped the rewards of driving for them with pole at Barcelona and, finally, a first win at home in the Monaco sprint race. He stood on the podium one more time, while his team-mate became champion.

2. Ralph Boschung SWITZERLAND 96 races
F2 (99 races): 1 win, 6 podiums, 163.5pts

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Most of what there is to say about Boschung has been said recently, but it’s still worth recapping his career at this level.

Boschung ran out of budget one round before the end in his rookie season in 2017, then suffered the same fate two rounds from the finish in 2018.

The funding dried up after five rounds in 2019, but he was able to return to return for two rounds later in the year, then in 2020 he only contested the season finale as a last-minute stand-in for Jack Aitken who had been summoned to race in F1.

The elusive prospect of a full F2 season finally occurred in 2021 with Campos, and having greater financial stability was reflected in Boschung’s results. He came 10th in the standings with two podiums, and started 2022 looking even stronger. After making the podium for a second time at Imola, Boschung’s season was ruined by a neck injury that kept him out of his car for 12 races. On his comeback at Spa he immediately made the podium, showing the potential that year could have held.

Now fully recovered, and with a Campos team that is benefitting from a high-profile technical signing, Boschung started 2023 with that all-important victory, and he leads the championship after four races. Could he win the title?

1. Rene Binder AUSTRIA 98 races
GP2/F2 (75 races): 16pts   FR3.5 (38 races): 4 wins, 2 poles, 10 podiums, 366pts   Top tier IndyCar (6 races): 61pts

Photo: Sebastiaan Rozendaal/Dutch Photo Agency

Binder’s 75-race career in GP2/F2 featured not a single result of note, but once he headed to FV8 3.5 his results, and the perception of him, started to change.

Driving for the Lotus-branded Charouz Racing System team, Binder made the podium five times and came seventh in the standings in 2016. The opposition may not have been at the same standard as GP2, but it was more the differences between team peformances that influenced Binder’s ability to fight towards the front in FV8 3.5.

He continued with Charouz for 2017, and although he had no answer to team-mate Pietro Fittipaldi he was one of the contenders to be best of the rest. After four-and-a-half years of waiting, Binder won a race for the first time at Monza.

The next day he won again at the track, and later in the year won from pole at Circuit of the Americas and Bahrain. Only Fittipaldi won more races than him, and – almost unimaginable just a year prior – Binder then stepped up to IndyCar in a part-time drive with Juncos Racing.

Now Boschung has won, the closest active driver to threatening Binder’s record is Carlin F2 driver Enzo Fittipaldi on 40 starts.

The post The longest waits for victory in the second tier of single-seater racing appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Macau GP Organising Committee

This weekend marks a big change for grand prix racing, as a new sprint race is run to decide who takes British GP pole. Sprint qualifying will be 100km, a distance most drivers last raced over in their junior careers

The second-shortest world championship Formula 1 race is set to take place this Saturday, with a 17-lap bout around Silverstone acting as the focal point of a format shake-up the owners of F1 have been angling over for some time.

It will controversially declare its winner the poleman for the British Grand Prix, which is the first time a series at a national level or higher has used something other than session laptimes (from practice or qualifying) or championship points (often when weather has led to session cancellations) to establish who officially gets pole other than IndyCar’s Iowa heat races in 2012*

Knockout events such as the Formula Ford Festival do use the winner of preceding races to set grids, but those heat races have their own qualifying sessions where the statistical record of taking pole is awarded.

That factor alone isn’t just what’s making this a step in the dark, as F1 has never scheduled races to be this short. Previous occasions where grands prix have ended up just north of 100 kilometres, or just over half that in the case of the flooded 1991 Australian Grand Prix, have been due to red flags. Drivers and teams prepare their cars for 200km or more.

The British F1 championship never ran races this short in the 1970s, and ignoring Bologna’s F1 Indoor Trophy events then the last race to use F1 regulations and be scheduled to be shorter than 100km were the 1967 Spring Cup heats at Oulton Park.

So when was the last time each of this year’s F1 field were sprinting for success in a single-seater?

Nikita Mazepin, Mick Schumacher & Yuki Tsunoda F2 2020 Sochi sprint race
Distance: 29.041km

A huge accident involving Jack Aitken and Luca Ghiotto cut this race short just as the Formula 2 title battle was getting tense, and half-points being awarded cost Yuki Tsunoda the title runner-up spot (if his finishing position went unchanged had this race run for the full duration).

Aitken and Ghiotto collided as they ran side-by-side through the very long Turn 3 left-hander as they fought over fourth.

Both went into the outside barriers at high speed, after Ghiotto’s car had already been sent airborne, and were able to retrieve themselves. Ghiotto did just in time before his car set on fire. The damage to the barriers neccessitated a red flag stoppage, and the length of those repairs meant the race wasn’t restarted and the results taken from the end of lap five.

Reversed grid poleman Guanyu Zhou was therefore named winner, ahead of Nikita Mazepin, Mick Schumacher and then the would-be retirees Aitken and Ghiotto. This proved costly in points terms for Schumacher’s main rivals Yuki Tsunoda and Callum Ilott, who were classified sixth and seventh.

Nicholas Latifi F2 2019 Sochi sprint race
Distance: 87.521km

Ghiotto withstood pressure from new F2 champion Nyck de Vries to seize victory in another truncated Sochi sprint race the year before, following a heavy lap one accident involving Aitken and Mazepin that led to Mazepin going wide and flying back onto the track and into Nobuharu Matsushita. Both ended up hurtling into the barriers, and the race was red flagged.

With de Vries having wrapped up the title in the previous race, his main rival Nicholas Latifi had nothing to lose. However the Canadian finished fourth, behind de Vries after starting ahead of him, and only got his finishing position after DAMS team-mate Sergio Sette Camara was penalised five seconds for rejoining the track unsafely.

De Vries finished second in the restarted 15-lap race, and Ilott was third.

Lando Norris & George Russell F2 2018 Monaco sprint race
Distance: 100.11km

The eventual 2018 F2 title contenders individually all had their worst weekends in Monaco, with Lando Norris doing the best job in making the sprint race podium but also being the only of the year’s top four to actually score on Monaco’s streets.

Ferrari junior Antonio Fuoco started from reversed grid pole, having finished the feature race in eighth place despite a drive-through penalty for putting Ghiotto in the barrier at the start.

Norris, who also picked up a feature race penalty for contact, started third and took a place immediately from a slower-starting Aitken, who then lacked power up the hill and had to retire with a technical issue.

An early virtual safety car to clear cars stranded on the grid was followed by a full safety car when Sean Gelael crashed heavily at the Swimming Pool on lap four of 30.

After initially building a one-second lead at the restart, Fuoco’s advantage was cut by Norris to just 0.3 seconds at one stage, before a particularly slow lap from the McLaren junior increased the gap to 1.7s.

Following a brief VSC when George Russell crashed on lap 20, Fuoco’s lead went above three seconds, where it remained until the safety car returned on lap 27 when Alex Albon and Roy Nissany collided exiting the tunnel.

With little warning, the race was restarted with two laps to go with Norris right up behind Fuoco, but the Italian enjoyed a good gap once he put his foot down out of the Swimming Pool section. The race was immediately neutralised once again though as Nirei Fukuzumi and Santino Ferrucci skated deep into La Rascasse on the restart.

That secured Fuoco victory and Norris second, but post-race both were found to have breached the VSC regulations and had the time they had illegally gained added to their race time. That had no effect on Fuoco, but dropped Norris to third behind Louis Deletraz.

Pierre Gasly FE 2017 New York E-Prix 2
Distance: 95.697km

Photo: Formula E

Photo: Formula E

The absence of Sebastien Buemi due to World Endurance Championship commitments meant Pierre Gasly was called up to run in Formula E’s two New York E-Prix races in 2017 during his title-challenging sole season in Super Formula.

It wasn’t a great start as he clouted his car against the circuit limits during qualifying for Saturday’s E-Prix, and it meant he started from 19th place. He maqde up for it later in the day by charging up the order and scoring six points with a seventh place finish.

It was a turnaround of form for the next day too, as he topped the entirety of group qualifying, but a major wide moment in the super pole session limited him to fourth place on the grid when pole was definitely on the cards. With laptimes of just over a minute, it meant the whole 49-lap race of Sunday could be completed in under an hour.

He dropped back at first, but was rapidly closing in on the battle for second place at the end. In fact he approached the battle too quick, slamming into the barriers at the final corner as looked at making a move on the two Mahindra cars ahead of him before they met the chequered flag.

Once Buemi was back in the series, Gasly’s time in FE was quickly forgotten. However he is the first FE driver to then go on to win a F1 grand prix.

Charles Leclerc F2 2017 Monaco sprint race
Distance: 100.11km

The first races on home soil for Charles Leclerc went, quite frankly, dreadfully. The F2 rookie took pole, and was controlling the feature race until a safety car interruption shortly after his pitstop.

The issue was the safety car picked up long-time leader Leclerc rather than yet-to-pit Oliver Rowland, who was then able to streak past Leclerc and make his own pitstop without a loss.

It only got worse for Leclerc, as vibrations on the front-left wheel led to a second trip to the pits. He rejoined the action, but then retired and that left him down in 17th on the grid for the sprint race.

While fellow rookie de Vries led home his veteran Rapax team-mate Johnny Cecotto Jr for an impressive first win, Leclerc toiled again as contact with Norman Nato at Rascasse put Nato into retirement and earned him a 10s penalty. His car wasn’t responding well after the clash though, and he soon retired too in the pits.

There was more turmoil in the coming weeks for Leclerc, but he put in some of the performances of his life thereafter to take a dominant title win.

Antonio Giovinazzi GP2 2016 Monaco sprint race
Distance: 100.11km

Photo: GP2 Media Service

A feature race error cost a potential maiden GP2 win for Antonio Giovinazzi on the streets of Monaco, but he instead left the principality with his first four races ending in 11th, retirement, 11th and 18th. A few weeks later he made up for it with a memorable double win in Baku.

He originally finished seventh in the Monaco feature race, but a penalty for cutting the chicane dropped him to 11th, and therefore took him from second to 11th on the sprint race grid.

There was no impressive comeback from the Italian, as he dropped to last on the opening lap and at first only gained places from drivers ahead retiring.

He passed Latifi, but that only brought him up to 18th and he remained in that position for 20 laps.

Honda junior Nobuharu Matsushita was promoted to pole off the back of Giovinazzi’s penalty, and he made the most of it to dominate. Marvin Kirchhofer finished a distant second, and Raffaele Marciello rounded out the podium.

Esteban Ocon GP3 2015 Abu Dhabi sprint race
Distance: 77.641km

Esteban Ocon claimed the 2015 GP3 title in the season finale at Yas Marina Circuit, while Campos Racing protege Alex Palou claimed his maiden series win.

Palou led the field off the line from reversed grid pole and quickly pulled away from Fuoco to triumph by 4.2 seconds.

Ocon made a strong start to his race from fifth on the grid, despite making light contact with title rival Luca Ghiotto. He went past Ghiotto and Matt Parry to move into third, which was enough to be champion.

Ghiotto did pressure Ocon for position for several laps but he couldn’t find a way through, meaning his five wins wasn’t enough against Ocon’s podium consistency for the ultimate prize.

Future Zakspeed star Jimmy Eriksson finished fifth, and Emil Bernstorff was sixth.

Max Verstappen F3 2014 Macau Grand Prix
Distance: 91.800km

Photo: MGPC

Photo: MGPC

The biggest race of Max Verstappen’s sole year in junior single-seaters was his win in front of his home fans in the Masters of F3 event at Zandvoort. That came in at 107.675km, but the shorter Macau Grand Prix carried more prestige.

Verstappen qualified third around the Guia Circuit, and moved up to second early on in the qualification race. However his inexperience got the better of him as he wrecked his rear suspension with contact and had to go to the pits to retire.

That left him in 24th place on the grid for the grand prix itself, denying any chance to use his pace to win. But it didn’t stop him from trying.

Five places were gained on lap one as a multi-car quagmire appeared following a collision between Vertstappen’s FIA European Formula 3 rivals Tom Blomqvist and Ocon further up the field. The resultant red flag delayed the action by some time, and wheen green flag racing ensued it became an early Verstappen masterclass.

He picked off on average one car per lap to rise all the way up to seventh place, taking fastest lap by almost a quarter of a second on the way. In addtion, he was the highest placed Volkswagen-powered driver in a race dominated by Mercedes’ unit.

Carlos Sainz Jnr FR3.5 2014 Hungaroring race 1
Distance: 96.382km

Roberto Merhi claimed his third Formula Renault 3.5 win in four races in a wet Hungary, finishing almost 30s clear of the field.

The Spaniard made his way from seventh on the grid to second at the start, then put several laps of pressure on poleman Oliver Rowland, who eventually cracked when he ran deep at turn one.

Merhi then ran away at an astonishing pace, while countryman and points leader Carlos Sainz Jr had a strong beginning to the race too to overcome a bad qualifying session. From 14th on the grid he made it to fourth, but further progress was halted by fellow Red Bull junior Gasly who defended hard.

As the track dried, Gasly then hunted down Rowland for second successfully as Sainz settled for fourth and a cut to his championship lead. It was a performance that, while impressive, didn’t help his ambitions of a 2015 F1 seat.

Series debutant Ocon held off the attention of Jazeman Jaafar to take ninth.

Valtteri Bottas FIA F3 Int. Trophy 2011 Macau Grand Prix
Distance: 91.800km

Photo: MGPC

Photo: MGPC

Valtteri Bottas’s main focus in 2011 was GP3, which he won the title in, and he also got his first F1 test with Williams. At the end of the year the focus was on a F3 return at the Macau GP with Double R Racing, and it started off encouragingly as the Finn went fourth fastest in qualifying.

He then kept it clean to retain that position in the qualification race, with some drivers able to get past but making mistakes that undid any advantage they briefly had over Bottas.

The main race was a different matter though, with far more risks being taken given what was on the line, and in the last of his three-wide moments going into Lisboa with Dani Juncadella and Felipe Nasr he braked later than his opponents – with rear brakes he was already struggling with – which left him with too much speed as he turned and he clattered the barriers. His race was over.

Daniel Ricciardo FR3.5 2011 Monaco
Distance: 100.200km

FR3.5 only held one race in its Monaco rounds, and that freed up Daniel Ricciardo to spend Thursday driving for Toro Rosso (now AlphaTauri) in F1 free practice.

When he hopped back into his usual car he was fastest in practice and qualifying, and that set up a lights-to-flag win. Brendon Hartley and Robert Wickens applied pressure through the first handful of laps, but Hartley started being more cautious and Wickens was saving his challenges for the end.

Two safety car interruptions kept Wickens on the tail of the leader, but strong corner exits for the leader meant there was nowhere around the circuit where Wickens could make a move. The result was Ricciardo’s second Monaco win, his fifth FR3.5 win and another point to take to Dr Helmut Marko to convince him he was already F1-worthy.

Sergio Perez GP2 2010 Monaco sprint race
Distance: 100.200km

Having brilliantly won the feature race the day before – his first win in the main GP2 series – Sergio Perez was therefore tasked with doing what he could from eighth on the grid in the sprint race. In one of the more chaotic Monaco races, Addax driver Perez kept his head cool to salvage a point.

Incidents for Scuderia Coloni’s Alberto Valerio and Racing Engineering’s Dani Clos, as well as a drive-through for Rapax’s Pastor Maldonado for jumping the start, allowed Perez to slide into the top six (and thus the points) despite being passed by Trident’s Cecotto.

At the end of the race, Perez was pressuring Rapax’s Luiz Razia while also holding off Arden’s Charles Pic. Up front, DAMS’ Jerome d’Ambrosio beat Addax’s Giedo van der Garde by a narrow margin, while ART Grand Prix’s Jules Bianchi made bold moves to take third on a track he would rise to stardom on four years later.

It was a rather incident-heavy race, with five drivers including Maldonado picking up penalties and seven of the 24 drivers not seeing the chequered flag.

Sebastian Vettel FR3.5 2007 Monaco
Distance: 83.500km

Photo: Renault Sport

Future two-time Monaco Grand Prix winner Sebastian Vettel would have had a stronger chance to win on the streets in FR3.5 not long before his F1 call-up with BMW Sauber if not for a simple luck of the draw.

The qualifying groups that year were decided with a draw, and Carlin driver Vettel was placed in what was the group that appeared to have the slower track conditions.

Tech 1 Racing’s Alvaro Parente was the lucky man on the day and put it together to stick it on pole despite hitting the wall, and future FE racer Salvador Duran thought he was on pole but set his fastest lap while yellow flags were being waved.

Parente nailed the start and had to withstand pressure throughout the 25-lap race from Vettel, who was never more than 1.5s behind. Vettel had a moment on lap 15, cutting the Swimming Pool chicane, but kept the pressure on until the end.

Duran barged his way from fifth to take third after passing Milos Pavlovic at the start and inheriting the final podium spot after Clivio Piccione spun late on. Future F1 driver van der Garde rounded out the top five.

Lewis Hamilton GP2 2006 Hungaroring sprint race
Distance: 100.756km

Photo: GP2 Media Service

The Hungaroring sprint race was held in abysmal conditions shortly before F1’s first wet race at the circuit. Hamilton was in the midst of the toughest round of his GP2 season, while title rival Nelson Piquet Jr aimed to be first to complete a perfect weekend.

Giorgio Pantano spun off on the sighting lap for GP2 drivers, and the race began under the safety car. The cars were released on lap three, with Hamilton starting from 10th following a recovery from crashing in practice, spinning in qualifying (which put him last) and then using scintillating pace to rise to 10th despite a drive-through in the feature race.

Jose Maria Lopez spun off early in the sprint race after starting from pole, before Andre Negrao had a huge shunt that allowed Piquet and Hamilton to make up ground. Piquet also made crucial moves on E.J. Viso and Hamilton’s ART Grand Prix team-mate Alexandre Premat for second.

That became first when Racing Engineering’s Adam Carroll, who was leading, spun into the barriers. Piquet enjoyed a five-second lead over Premat, who did not make it easy for his team-mate to get by.

Piquet went on to complete the first GP2 perfect weekend – pole, both wins and both fastest laps – while Hamilton salvaged a second place from 10th on the grid and Premat completed the podium.

While the Hungaroring sprint race marginally exceeds the length of F1’s first sprint race, Hamilton did end the previous year with victory, pole and fastest lap in the 82.332km F3 Euro Series finale at Hockenheim.

Kimi Raikkonen FR Eurocup 2000 Spa-Francorchamps
Distance: 76.648km

Photo: Renault Sport

Kimi Raikkonen is synonymous with Spa-Francorchamps, so it’s only apt that he triumphed in a Formula Renault Eurocup outing in the Ardennes having already clinched the United Kingdom crown a month earlier.

Charles Zwolsman was on pole, but Manor Motorsport’s Raikkonen got by on the run down to Eau Rouge and simply sprinted off into the distance after that, opening up a lead of four seconds to a charging Matteo Grassotto, who started fifth.

Grassotto had to battle with Raikkonen’s future Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa to take third place before working his way past Zwolsman for second.

Such was Raikkonen’s pace in the race, he told Autosport at the time that “the first day was tough” when qualifying was held, but that “in the race, it was okay again, and I was able to back off to conserve my pace”. Another future F1 driver – one-off star Markus Winkelhock – finished sixth and Massa came home in eighth.

Fernando Alonso FOpen by Nissan 1999 Valencia Ricardo Tormo race 2
Distance: 100.125km

While Fernando Alonso clinched the Formula Open by Nissan title in the finale at Valencia in his most recent sprint race, there was controversy surrounding it.

The Campos Racing rookie worked his way past title rival Manuel Giao on lap two of the race to take second place behind future IndyCar racer Tomas Scheckter, but Scuderia Famo’s Giao felt the move was done under yellow flags.

Alonso undercut Scheckter in the pits to take the win and the title in the finale. Giao protested the overtake but to no avail, and he later appealed the decision.

Behind Alonso was series debutant (and race one winner) Scheckter, with Angel Burgueno rounding out the podium ahead of Giao.

*This article originally ommitted mention of IndyCar’s 2012 Iowa races, where qualifying and a knockout format combined for a final heat where the winner was awarded pole for the main race. The race had its own points format to reward its finishers rather than awarding a point for pole.

The post The last time each current F1 driver did ‘sprint qualifying’-distance races appeared first on Formula Scout.

Recapping the junior careers of Formula 1’s 2022 grid, aided by photos of the drivers in their racing youth

MERCEDES-AMG

Lewis Hamilton was already a Formula 1 junior during his karting years, last millennium, and the support of McLaren took him from the international scene through to single-seaters in Formula Renault 2.0, Formula 3 and GP2. He started off in FR2.0 UK with Manor Motorsport and took his first win at Thruxton. He added another two wins during the season, but was more impressive in the Eurocup where he had the highest scoring rate of anyone in his part-season and was fifth in the points.

A second season resulted in a dominant UK title and the first F3 appearances for Hamilton, all with Manor, and in 2004 he was reunited with karting rival Nico Rosberg in the F3 Euro Series. It was the German who came out on top, but Hamilton ended the year with a rapid showing in the Macau Grand Prix and a stunning win in the Bahrain Superprix. A falling out followed with his McLaren boss Martin Whitmarsh, who tore up Hamilton’s contract when he and his father pushed for a move up to GP2.

A few weeks later Hamilton re-signed with McLaren after agreeing to another year in F3. A switch to Frederic Vasseur’s ASM/ART Grand Prix operation resulted in back-to-back titles in the Euro Series and GP2, and despite some testing struggles on Michelin tyres he was promoted to a McLaren seat in F1 immediately after. The rest is history.

Noted for his maturity from a young age, it was still difficult for George Russell to get noticed by F1. Highly-rated in karting where he won back-to-back European titles, his first year in cars was split between BRDC British Formula 4 and FR2.0 abroad, and it was the former where he won his first title. But it was the latter where he more frequently raised eyebrows, especially when a change of teams resulted in a Eurocup win.

He was in European F3 the next year, winning his second race but claiming just two other podiums. His second season was better, and with a less experienced team, and while he was overpowered by Stroll in the title race, Mercedes recognised his  potential and signed him up. Working with F1’s top team unlocked a new level of performance, and Russell brushed off unreliability to become GP3 and F2 champion with ART. He then sweet-talked Williams into handing him an F1 seat.

SCUDERIA FERRARI

In the face of frequent tragedy, Charles Leclerc was a wanted talent in every series he raced in, guided by established F1 driver manager Nicolas Todt since a glittering karting career. It was Fortec Motorsports that won out to run him in FR2.0 Alps as a single-seater rookie, when he was the best driver bar veteran Nyck de Vries, even on wildcard appearances in a packed Eurocup field.

That earned him a move to FIA European F3 with Van Amersfoort Racing, where some early wins and displays of wet weather ability initially put him in title contention, and despite a lengthy podiumless run afterwards he was signed by the Ferrari Driver Academy. That preceded a GP3 move with ART, which resulted in the title, and he was the class of the Formula 2 field with Prema a year later despite his fair share of bad luck.

Carlos Sainz Jr arrived in single-seaters during Formula BMW Europe’s ultra-competitive final season in 2010, and his rookie crown raised the stakes for the Red Bull protege. What followed was initially just as slick, winning the FR Northern European Cup and finishing second in the Eurocup. On moving up to F3, he again demonstrated the talent he’d inherited from his world rally champion father with four wet-weather wins in the British series, but underwhelmed at other times.

Red Bull moved him to GP3, where he struggled badly, finishing 10th in the points when team-mate Daniil Kvyat won the title straight out of FR2.0. Confidence-boosting Formula Renault 3.5 cameos with Zeta Corse led to a full-time switch to the series with DAMS, and he dominated the 2014 season. His F1 chance only came however when Sebastian Vettel left Red Bull for Ferrari, leaving a vacant Toro Rosso space.

RED BULL RACING

There’s not much to say about Max Verstappen‘s junior single-seater career, beyond it redefining what was expected of young drivers of the present day. The World Karting champion debuted in America in the Ferrari Driver Academy-organised Florida Winter Series, where he was up against some of F3’s finest. He took fastest lap in his first race, was on pole for his third, and a winner by his sixth.

This put expectation on him for European F3 with VAR, having shunned debuting in FR2.0 instead, and he delivered. After winning six races in a row and Masters of F3 he became a Red Bull junior and then days later an F1 driver. Having come third in the European standings, he ended his single year in the junior ranks with seventh in Macau from the back of the grid after crashing out of the qualifying race.

It wasn’t until his fifth year in single-seaters that Sergio Perez took an overall win, having spent his formative years dabbling in A1GP and the secondary class of British F3 as well as the more regular entry-level series. In F3 he did win the title though, and he stuck with the underdog T-Sport team for a season in the primary class where he won a respectable four races, regularly leading the championship before fading late on.

Wins in his debut GP2 Asia campaign that followed was false promise for the main series he stepped up to with Christian Horner’s Arden team, but his sophomore season featured five wins and the title runner-up spot against some quality but inconsistent opposition, earning his F1 break with Sauber and some Ferrari ties.

McLAREN

No other driver this century has had as successful a start to a single-seater career than Lando Norris, with an incredible five titles in his first three seasons. Following a circuit-learning Ginetta Junior campaign alongside his world championship-winning final year in karts, Norris started off with the British F4 title, as well as successful cameos in the German and Italian series.

He used his backing to contest a total of 61 races the following year, winning the Toyota Racing Series in New Zealand and then two FR2.0 titles in Europe, as well as four BRDC British F3 races in a part-season. In 2017 came his first role with McLaren and the European F3 crown – the first for Carlin after six years of Prema domination – and a sixth title just went amiss in his single year in F2.

Daniel Ricciardo raced in Australia, East Asia, Italy, the UK and across Europe for three years with little to show before a driver shootout propelled him into Red Bull’s books and top equipment. He started life as an F1 junior with the FR2.0 West European Cup title and a close second place to Bottas in the Eurocup, and followed it up with a romp to the British F3 title against an admittedly underpar field.

The step up to FR3.5 was therefore a truer test of his ability, and he came just two points short of title glory there too against series veteran Mikhail Aleshin. He returned to the series part-time the following year – winning the Monaco race for the second year in succession – working it around F1 practice outings before Red Bull found him a race seat at HRT.

ALPINE

Spotted by the late Adrian Campos in karts, Fernando Alonso was brought under his wing on a three-year plan. He debuted in FR3.5 predecessor Euro Open by Nissan in 1999 aged 17 and won on his debut weekend, adding five more wins and a title earned on dropped scores before moving to GP2 predecessor International Formula 3000.

Results were lacking at first, but Alonso jumped to fourth in the points with a first win in the final race at Spa. He was an F1 tester for Minardi too, and got a race seat there in his third year in single-seaters. He moved on to Renault with success, and returned there last year under its new name.

F1 had a close eye on Esteban Ocon from karting, when he was picked up by the Gravity management company tied to the Lotus team. His first year of car racing was actually way short of what was expected, but he picked up his game after that and succeeded a race-winning year in FR2.0 in 2013 with an era-defining European F3 title against Tom Blomqvist and Verstappen in 2014.

That crowning moment coincided with the tightening of belts by Lotus ownership, but Mercedes helped him into GP3 where he won another title, thanks this time to consistency more than speed. Then he was moved into the DTM for half a season prior to his F1 debut.

ALPHATAURI

Pierre Gasly raced only for French operations during his first three years in cars, which started with wins in French F4 that earned him some early attention from Red Bull. His rookie Eurocup season wasn’t enough to retain that initial support, but he somewhat unexpectedly won the title the following year, leading Red Bull to sign him outright to its junior team as he made the natural step up to FR3.5.

This marked the start of a lengthy winless spell. He was runner-up in FR3.5 with eight podiums, and took four podiums and three poles in GP2 a year later. Over 1000 days after his last victory, he escaped a road accident to win a GP2 race at Silverstone in 2016, and adding three more won him the title but not an F1 seat. Only an astonishing Super Formula campaign, in which only a typhoon denied him a shot at the title, was able to do that.

After tasting Japanese F4 in 2016, Yuki Tsunoda committed to the series in 2017 as well as contesting the more mechanically complex JAF Japan F4 series. He became grand champion in the latter, but also finished third in the FIA series. Focusing solely on Japanese F4 for 2018 lifted him further and he became Honda’s first champion.

Making the move to Europe, Tsunoda was placed in FIA F3 and Euroformula as a Red Bull junior for 2019, and his racecraft was brilliant in both. He won with a less-fancied team in FIA F3, and was rewarded with promotion to F2, where he surprised by fighting for the title and earning his 2021 F1 seat.

ASTON MARTIN

Like Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel is one of a rare few drivers that have been guided to F1 by a team all the way from karting. It was Red Bull who spotted Vettel’s talent, also very early in his career in the previous millennium, and he made the transition to cars locally in FBMW. It took him two attempts to dominate the ADAC championship, and he only found success in F3 once moving to ASM – by which point he was already an F1 test driver with BMW Sauber.

It was Vettel’s cameos that really caught in the eye in the lower formula, including Macau, Spanish F3 and FR3.5. In 2007 he was set for a full campaign in the latter, and was leading the championship with Carlin before he was plucked away into F1 with BMW Sauber and then Toro Rosso.

Lance Stroll won almost from the off in single-seaters and had Ferrari support from the off too, having been signed to its academy at the age of 11. His presence was almost certainly key to the creation of the Florida Winter Series and he showed well there before gliding to the Italian F4 title, where the combined might of Prema and Ferrari helped considerably with a brand new car.

Winning the TRS title a few months later, in similarly easy fashion, meant more of the same was expected in European F3. Against a talent-stacked field that was not the case as a rookie, especially when it came to his wheel-to-wheel form, which earned him plenty of critics after two significant crashes. He was still fifth in the points though, and he dominated his sophomore season while preparing with Williams to step up to F1. On the side, he also starred in a prototype in the Daytona 24 Hours.

ALFA ROMEO

Photo: ACI Sport

Valtteri Bottas had most of his junior series success with ART GP, as he won the Masters of F3 race twice and the GP3 title with the team. His early experience came in FR2.0 too, and he won Europe’s two biggest titles in 2008 with Motopark Academy, whose boss Timo Rumpfkeil orchestrated backing from Bottas’s future F1 chief Toto Wolff as well as Mika Hakkinen.

His second F3 season coincided with a shift in power from ART and Mercedes to Signature and Volkswagen, meaning he missed out on the Euro Series title. Hence the move to GP3, where he went from 10th in the points to champion after four wins in the final four rounds. Bottas’s F1 break didn’t come through a GP2 campaign, instead earning a promotion from test driver at Williams following a year out of racing.

China’s first F2 racer Zhou Guanyu benefited from Ferrari and Renault/Alpine backing prior to jumping into an Alfa Romeo seat this year alongside the team’s other new signign Bottas, and he’s entering F1 with one single-seater title to his name.

In 2021 he won the Formula Regional Asian Championship with Abu Dhabi Racing by Prema in between his second and third seasons in F2 with Virtuosi Racing. That title success earned him additional FIA superlicence points that were crucial for strengthening his bargaining hand in F1 silly season, and three wins in the first half of the F2 season helped him further.

His end position in the championship was third, an improvement on his previous two seasons, and also showing that he was able to be an equal to the more highly-touted drivers on the grid.

Prior to his F2 blossoming, Zhou claimed two wins from three years in European F3, was a TRS race-winner and perhaps most impressively was Italian F4 runner-up in his first full year racing cars.

HAAS

Efforts were made to hide Mick Schumacher‘s family connection early in his career to avoid media pressure, but his karting results, as well as Deutsche Vermögensberatung sponsorship, marked him out. VAR provided Schumacher with his first single-seater berth in F4, and winning in his first ever weekend suggested he would be one to watch. But the reversed-grid victory proved to be a false dawn for the rookie, and only found the pace and consistency needed in his second season.

That was the same in other series Schumacher entered: runner-up in ADAC and Italian F4, third in the MRF Challenge and winning the European F3 title in his sophomore season. Ferrari picked him up after that, and developed him over two years of F2 into an F1-worthy talent.

A late change means there’s no Nikita Mazepin alongside Schumacher, but instead Kevin Magnussen returns to the team after a year out racing in IMSA and IndyCar after he was replaced by Mazepin.

Magnussen followed a similar junior series path to his father Jan, also a former F1 driver, as he won the Danish Formula Ford title then after coming second in FR2.0 NEC went to race in F3. He was third in Germany as a rookie, then after some bad luck with engine issues was able to be runner-up to Felipe Nasr in the British championship in 2011 while also starring in European appearances.

He was a McLaren F1 junior by this point, and the team entered him into FR3.5 for his next step. A thought-provoking first season with Carlin, which did include a win, led him to working even harder and then obliterating the field through much of 2013 with DAMS. Those performances were enough to convince McLaren he was worthy of an F1 seat the next year.

WILLIAMS

Photo: Joe Portlock

A late start to karting, and a sideline in Porsches, are two of the oddities of Nicholas Latifi‘s pre-F1 path, and he has only got stronger with each category he has moved on to. He had an unconventional start in Italian F3, where he did win, then took the only poles of his racing career in British F3.

Seasons in European F3 and FR3.5 didn’t show signs of race-winning form, but upon making it to GP2 with DAMS he began to settle down. He finished second in his first race with the team, after imperious testing form, and finished fifth in the points in his second full season. Illness and a new car to learn held him back in 2018, but he did add another win and started the 2019 season on fire before his title campaign ran out of steam.

Despite a lack of titles, Alex Albon now has one of the most well-known paths to F1 in the modern era due to his early dropping by Red Bull and then invitation back to the brand in 2019 when it was in search of a driver to race for Toro Rosso.

The Thai started straight away in FR2.0, and a points-free Eurocup campaign led to him losing his Red Bull junior status. He still had enough money to race in the series, and on his return picked up a pole and four points finishes in 2013.

Another jump in performance put him third in the 2014 points, although he only had three podiums, and in the NEC he picked up his first car racing win. Joining a revived Signature team in European F3 was an inspired move for Albon’s next step, as he earned pole positions and podiums in a field stacked with future F1 talents.

There was no return for a title attack though, as he moved to GP3 with a plum ART GP seat and challenged Leclerc for the 2016 title. The team kept him for his move up to F2 the next year, but a training accident meant he missed a round and endured a difficult campaign. His budget was also not in place for a second season, and he did find a seat at DAMS for 2018 but only on a round-by-round basis. Three poles and a win in the first four rounds helped him secure a full-time berth, and the results he put in after then earned him a top Formula E seat with Nissan e.dams before Red Bull stole him for F1.

The post What the drivers of F1 2022 did first appeared first on Formula Scout.

Having annually ranked the top 50 drivers in junior single-seater racing since 2011, Formula Scout is now also recognising the achievements of the very best of those who ‘graduate’ into the world of professional racing each year.

Here is Formula Scout’s Class of 2019… Key Wins (W), poles (P), fastest laps (FL)

9. Ukyo Sasahara JAPAN 24y/o
15th in Super GT, 18th in Super Formula, NC in Asian F3 (3 W, 4 P, 1 FL)   2019: Asian F3 champion (8 W, 7 P, 7 FL)

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

The former Formula Renault star has essentially gone through his single-seater career twice now, with his first taking him up to FIA European Formula 3, and the second starting off in Japanese Formula 4 and concluding in a Super Formula seat.

Admittedly the Red Bull athlete only got his SF chance after travel restrictions prevented Red Bull’s Formula 1 junior Juri Vips from racing, but he was chosen by Team Mugen as the replacement because he was highly rated by team manager Shinji Nakano.

Sasahara had only done three Super GT races with Mugen at this point, with a best finish of 10th, but Nakano had already said his signing was good enough to race in F1 in the future. This came after a 2019 in which as well as winning the Asian F3 title with Hitech GP, Sasahara also became the first winner of the Motorsport Games GT Cup and was Porsche Carrera Cup Japan champion.

That momentum continued into 2020 at first as he returned to Asian F3 as a guest, consistently beating the likes of future Haas F1 drivers Pietro Fittipaldi and Nikita Mazepin.

In Super GT he made the top five in qualifying once, at Suzuka, but wasn’t able to make anything of it after his car lost a wheel just a few laps in. There was redemption next time out at Twin Ring Motegi though as he claimed his first and only podium of the season alongside Hideki Mutoh.

The SF season was far less rewarding, having not tested the Dallara SF19 car before, and in the early rounds he struggled with the series’ soft compound tyre supplied by Yokohama. He progressed a lot over the seven-round season, particularly in qualifying where he ended up with a higher average starting spot than title contenders Ryo Hirakawa and Nick Cassidy, and in the final race at Fuji Speedway he was fighting both of those drivers on track on the way to his first points finish in seventh.

8. Oliver Askew USA 23y/o
19th in IndyCar   2019: Indy Lights champion (7 W, 7 P, 5 FL)   2018: 3rd in IP2000 (1 W, 3 P, 2 FL)

Photo: IndyCar

Photo: IndyCar

So much was expected from reigning Indy Lights champion Oliver Askew as he stepped up to IndyCar this year with the returning McLaren, a team co-run with Schmidt Petersen Motorsports, but he ultimately failed to deliver.

The Floridian looked at his strongest on the ovals, but he admitted himself that he lacked the consistency needed to make progress race-by-race over such a compressed season with limited practice time due to the pandemic.

Besides qualifying fifth at the Indianapolis Grand Prix, his second IndyCar start, which he then crashed out of, he was usually struggling on one-lap pace and only made the top 10 on the grid again on his end-of-season return in St. Petersburg.

• Feature: The youthful dynamic that’s already moved McLaren to the front

His absence from the previous double-header, also on Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s road course, was a result of concussion he picked up in a nasty crash during the Indianapolis 500 – a race he led for a few laps – two months prior.

Besides the Indy 500, the only other round where he looked capable of fighting at the front like team-mate Patricio O’Ward was the Iowa double-header. In the first race of that weekend he picked up his first IndyCar podium in third place, then in race two he led for 10 laps on the way to sixth place.

His season had begun encouragingly with a ninth place on the Texas oval, ahead of O’Ward, but before season’s end it had already been announced he wouldn’t be retained for 2021 and finishing 16th from 10th on the grid in St. Pete didn’t turn too many heads.

It was a trying season with a few instances of contact with other drivers, but overall nothing to say that Askew doesn’t deserve a second year in IndyCar. It’s a shame then that he is unlikely to be returning to the grid soon.

7. Sergio Sette Camara BRAZIL 22y/o
20th in Super Formula (1 P), 27th in FE   2019: 4th in F2 (2 W, 2 P, 2 FL)   2018: 6th in F2 (1 P, 3 FL)  2017: 12th in F2 (1 W, 1 FL)

Photo: FIA Formula E

Photo: FIA Formula E

Once a Red Bull junior and then a McLaren one too, Sette Camara was snapped up by Red Bull once again as its F1 reserve driver for this year. This came after after signing as Dragon Racing’s reserve in Formula E and courting IndyCar interest, and not long before he took a place in B-MAX Racing by Motopark’s SF line-up. He was going to be in a lot of places in 2020.

Obviously the pandemic stripped back many of those commitments, and his first summoning came in FE’s six-race week-long Berlin season finale in August. He replaced Brendon Hartley in the team’s line-up, and Sette Camara knew he would have to be on top of his game to even match two-time World Endurance champion Hartley’s haul of two points in the first five races.

He was last in qualifying for his debut on the circuit’s reverse layout, and was set to finish 21st before exceeding the maximum limit of 45kWh on electrical energy used in the race and was disqualified as a result.

The next day brought an improved 20th place on the grid, and he came 17th after another driver got disqualified for the same reason as he did.

Reverting to the circuit’s standard layout for the next two races suited Sette Camara far more, having navigated this route on the team simulator before, and he earned the team’s highest starting spot of the 2019-20 season by qualifying 11th for the first of those. His race ended in a multi-car crash though, and he would start from last place the next day.

There was no redemption in the race, but on the very green alternative layout used for the final two races of the season a few days later he made the most of being in the later – and grippier – qualifying groups to qualify ninth twice. He faded down to 15th and 19th in the races, but beat team-mate Nico Muller in both.

Two months later he finally made his SF debut at Sportsland SUGO, after missing the opening two rounds, but it began in embarrassing style for the Formula 2 graduate with a red flag-causing spin in free practice. Sette Camara got lucky to scrape through the first two stages of qualifying, but then stunned the paddock by earning B-MAX its first series pole on his debut.

Having never made a practice start in the car it was no surprise that he lost the lead off the line, but ran in a comfortable second place until the pitstop phase of the race. After his stop, he went just four corners before crashing out on cold tyres. It was a painful end to a very encouraging debut, and his only start in Japan before returning to F1 and FE duties in Europe.

6. Toshiki Oyu JAPAN 22y/o
4th in Super GT300, 6th in Super Formula (1 win)   2019: 4th in SF Lights (1 W), 14th in Euroformula (2 W, 2 P)

If it wasn’t for crashing into his Nakajima Racing team-mate Tadasuke Makino, among others, and often making a mess of race starts in his rookie SF season then Oyu would be far higher up this list. But by professional standards, he was really putting his job at risk with the race-ruining collisions he started his professional career with.

What puts him at number six though is the way he turned it around, with an end of season qualifying average that was third best of the season regulars and a win and a podium that left him sitting handsomely as top rookie in the points by some way.

• Feature: How “worried” Nakajima had his faith in Oyu rewarded

His breakthrough win from second on the grid at Suzuka, the penultimate race of the season, was inherited after Nick Cassidy had an engine failure but it came after a mistake-free performance for the first time. He then followed that up with a charge from seventh to second at Fuji, proving he could actually race wheel-to-wheel too.

He certainly had the opportunity to beat Sho Tsuboi to victory too, and did attempt a move on the eventual race winner, but to not take further risks in going for the win showed the development Oyu had made over his up-and-down first year in SF.

The Honda junior, who was a winner in Euroformula and Super Formula Lights in 2019, also got parachuted into a seat in Super GT300 – the secondary class of Super GT – with Team Aguri and came fourth in his first campaign in a car with a roof.

Only one other car scored in seven of the eight races, although Oyu’s non-score came through a problem of his own making again. He was fighting for second place with just a few laps to go, and ended up punting the rear of the car ahead. That ripped off his bonnet and led to a fluid leak, as well as a loss of positions, before he brought the car to a stop on the next lap.

5. Sacha Fenestraz ARGENTINA/FRANCE 21y/o
4th in Super GT, 13th in Super Formula   2019: SF Lights champion (8 W, 5 P, 9 FL), 6th in Super GT300 (1 P)

Photo: Super GT

Photo: TGR Media Service

Like Oyu, Fenestraz starred in qualifying as a SF rookie but then had crashes mostly undo his hard work, although often these were Oyu’s fault. In the season opener the reigning SF Lights champion made the front row and after being passed by his team-mate Kenta Yamashita finished third, becoming one of a rare few to make the podium on their debut.

He completed five racing laps in three rounds as he was often hit out, but he had the highest qualifying average of anyone. As his Kondo Racing team’s form started to dip he then finally got a chance to finish some races, although was out after one lap again in the first race of Suzuka’s double-header, and he rose up the order to finish an impressive eighth in the season finale.

• Feature: Why 2020 could have propelled Sacha Fenestraz back into F1’s view (February)

The Franco-Argentinian Toyota protege had a better time of it in Super GT, where he was promoted to the top class with TOM’S after starring in GT300 in 2019.

His first three races all resulted in podiums, leaving him and team-mate Yuhi Sekiguchi as points leaders. The success ballast that came from that made his job a whole lot harder in the two rounds after, where he was a pointless 11th and 12th.

Fenestraz fought his way to seventh in round five at Suzuka, bringing him back to within two points of the title lead. A balance issue then left him down in 13th at Motegi, and as one of the title outsiders once more. Third place in the Fuji finale lifted Fenestraz and Sekiguchi up to fourth in the points, but they had the potential to be champions.

Early in the year he also took part in the FE rookie test in Marrakech for Jaguar, and was 10th fastest.

4. Dorian Boccolacci FRANCE 22y/o
5th in Lamborghini ST Europe (2 W, 1 P), 12th in ADAC GT Masters (1 W), 15th in GTWCE Endurance   2019: 14th in F2

Being picked up by three manufacturers in a single year, as well as winning at the Nurburgring 24 Hours, is quite the first season in professional motorsport, and it’s only because F2 graduate Dorian Boccolacci was making his mark in GT3 – which have driver aids and are often set-up to be friendly for gentleman drivers rather than for outright speed – rather than the highest echelon of sportscars which holds back his placing.

You could argue that Boccolacci was up against as tough as opposition as anyone on this list, as he took in programmes in the Intercontinental GT Challenge, GT World Challenge Europe, Lamborghini Super Trofeo Europe and ADAC GT Masters.

His main success came as an official Lamborghini young driver in its one-make series, where he was partnered up with 2012 Italian Formula Renault 2.0 champion Kevin Gilardoni. The pairing won twice together at Barcelona and were fifth in the points.

• Feature: The junior driver spurned by Renault’s last F1 name change

Audi customer team Sainteloc Racing called upon Boccolacci’s services for GTWC Endurance, which rivals WEC’s GTE Pro class as the top GT racing series in the world, and he did a solid job to come fifth on his debut in the Imola 3 Hours.

He was 10th in the Nurburgring 6 Hours, but returned to the circuit – and its full Nordschleife layout – for its 24-hour race a few weeks later in a Porsche. Boccolacci entered as a warm-up for the Spa 24 Hours, which is a GTWCE round, and he made it through some of the wettest conditions imaginable to win his class in 41st place.

That boosted his confidence for Spa, where he and his Sainteloc team-mates were one of the victory contenders throughout. With two hours to go it was Boccolacci who led the field on a soaking wet track, and a splash-and-dash pitstop a few minutes later only dropped him one spot. His final stop an hour later under the safety car cost him his victory shot though, and he came third best in a four-way fight for fourth that went to the chequered flag.

The 22-year-old’s other campaign was in a Zakspeed-run Mercedes-AMG in Germany, where he was also a winner. Which manufacturer could the Frenchman be on the payroll of next year?

3. Nicholas Latifi CANADA 25y/o
21st in F1   2019: 2nd in F2 (4 W, 3 FL)   2018: 9th in F2 (1 W, 3 FL)   2017: 5th in F2 (1 W, 2 FL)   2016: 16th in GP2

Photo: Williams Racing

Photo: Williams Racing

From the outside, it looked like Latifi did everything Williams asked of him in his first year in F1, and team-mate George Russell’s brief promotion to Mercedes showed just how high quality the bar was being set for Latifi to try to match.

He was outqualified for all 17 races, although that was to be expected after Russell did the same to Robert Kubica in 2019 and came close to beating Valtteri Bottas when partnered with him at Mercedes for the Sakhir Grand Prix.

• Feature: Why Nicholas Latifi’s rise to F1 is more remarkable than you think

It was a fairly clean season for Latifi, although it wasn’t like he was often in wheel-to-wheel battle due to Williams’ backmarker car, and it was only at the Turkish Grand Prix where he was particularly error prone as he spun off in qualifying and had a race-ending collision.

His only other two retirements weren’t even his fault, with him being one of many caught out by the safety car restart chaos at Mugello’s Tuscan Grand Prix, and then an oil leak ending his Sakhir GP.

He often raced competitively and on three occasions he finished 11th, putting him ahead of Russell in the standings until his Mercedes call-up, but he really needs to get closer to his team-mate on pace if he wants to stay with the team for a third season after 2021. At the same time, in a season as tricky as this one to become a rookie in – while Williams was changing management too – he did a good job in what were the fastest cars in F1 history.

2. Rinus VeeKay NETHERLANDS 20y/o
14th in IndyCar (1 P, 1 FL)   2019: 2nd in Indy Lights (6 W, 7 P, 6 FL), Asian F3 Winter Series champion (4 W, 2 P, 4 FL)

Photo: IndyCar

Photo: IndyCar

One race into VeeKay’s IndyCar career and the Dutch teenager was already under a lot of scrutiny. In free practice at Texas he crashed heavily and clumsily, ruling him out of qualifying later that day as repairs were done to his car to ensure he could race. His day didn’t improve, as in the race he lost it on the high line and wiped himself and Alex Palou out on the spot.

The 2019 Indy Lights runner-up was able to rebound whenever he faced a low though, and despite qualifying down the field for round two at Indianapolis, he was able to charge his way up the order and finish fifth through some clinical overtaking and defensive work on a circuit his Ed Carpenter Racing team usually wasn’t strong at in its road course form.

• Feature: Rinus VeeKay: IndyCar’s answer to Max Verstappen? (2019)

He was back in the headlines for crashing at Iowa, although this time it was because Colton Herta rode over his car on a restart and it highlighted how the new-for-2020 aeroscreen cockpit protection device had ensured both drivers emerged alive and unscathed.

Once again he rebounded in fine style. He was the only Chevrolet-powered driver to make the Fast Nine in Indy 500 qualifying, and put himself fourth on the grid as well setting the fastest ‘no tow’ lap on Carb Day. The race didn’t go to plan, as he earned a penalty after sliding into one of his crew members during a pitstop, but his pace with oval specialist ECR had been encouraging and at the Gateway double-header a week later he claimed a sixth and a fourth.

At Mid-Ohio he was a top 10 contender again, then on the return to the IMS road course he took his first pole by a massive 0.7803 seconds. During the first half of the race he fought for the lead with Herta lap after lap, then in the last stint he hunted down his rival and passed him to claim his first podium. VeeKay ended 2020 as IndyCar’s Rookie of the Year and with his seat at ECR already secured for 2021.

1. Nyck de Vries NETHERLANDS 25y/o
5th in ELMS (1 W, 1 FL), 11th in FE, 13th in WEC (1 LMP2 win)   2019: F2 champion (4 W, 5 P, 3 FL)   2018-19: 25th in WEC

Photo: FIA Formula E

Photo: FIA Formula E

Nyck de Vries was headed towards the ultimate journeyman career in junior single-seaters even as he marched towards the 2019 F2 title, but Mercedes-Benz then came calling after using him as its simulator driver and signed him for its foray into FE.

The professionalism that made de Vries stand out at the very start of his time in car racing meant he fitted seamlessly into the F1-esque Mercedes operation and as team-mate to Stoffel Vandoorne there was a shared experience of falling foul of F1 – and especially McLaren’s – politics.

On his debut at the tricky Riyadh street circuit in Saudi Arabia he topped his qualifying group and put himself third on the grid, then drove a strong race to sixth. Besides the top six drivers in FE’s first ever race in 2014, only one other driver has matched or eclipsed sixth place on their series debut, and that was ex-F1 driver Scott Speed way back in season one.

• Opinion: What being a world championship means to Formula E (January)

De Vries went from hero to zero in race two of that weekend, qualifying last and then charging up to eighth only to be docked 29s and thrown back to 16th for overtaking behind the safety car and a technical infringement on his car.

In Santiago he again excelled in the race, showing off his racecraft to make it onto the podium – which was then taken away from him by a five-second penalty for using battery coolant that was too cool.

He qualified third in Mexico City, and was running in fifth before a race-ending clash with Virgin Racing’s Robin Frijns that came about after his front wheels locked while using fanboost. A similar software issue led to another driver crashing too.

De Vries just kept at it despite the setbacks, and qualified fourth in Marrakech – the final race before the COVID-19 pandemic. He was running third when he was issued with a drive-through penalty for using too much power during regeneration, and rose back up to 11th place after that.

In Berlin the penalties and crashes kept on coming, overshadowing how brilliantly he had adapted to the series’ unique challenges, but it ended on a high as he completed a Mercedes one-two behind Vandoorne in the final race and gave Mercedes little choice but to sign both drivers for a second season. Expect wins in 2021.

De Vries also excelled in sportscars this year, winning in WEC and the European Le Mans Series in LMP2 machinery. He is now a mainstay in the prototype sportscar paddock, and may well be in contention for a future Le Mans Hypercar seat.

The post Formula Scout’s Class of 2019 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Williams Racing

Williams’ reserve driver Jack Aitken will make his Formula 1 free practice debut in place of George Russell in this weekend’s Styrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring.

Aitken joined Williams at the start of February, having previously been a junior, test and then reserve driver for Renault.

His Formula 2 season with Campos Racing started this weekend at the Red Bull Ring, and he picked up a point in the sprint race with a charge up the order to eighth after a penalty related to a formation lap infringement ruined his feature race.

Williams announced his FP1 call-up late on Sunday, following the Austrian Grand Prix in which F2 graduate Nicholas Latifi made his F1 race debut in with the team and finished 11th. The car which Aitken will sample failed to finish in the hands of Russell due to a fuel pressure issue.

“It’s definitely an exciting step in my career, and one that I’ve been trying to prepare for over the last few weeks,” Aitken said.

“I’ve been doing a lot of work in the team’s simulator and trying to make sure that I can just jump in and do the job.

The whole idea is for me to get in the car fairly early on in the season. There’s obviously an increased risk this year that teams will need to call on their reserve drivers and, should that happen, I need to be as ready as possible to just get in and be familiar with the car and all the procedures.

“This is the best way to do that and I can’t wait to get my first taste of the Williams on track.”

With the risk of drivers being being made unavailable to race due to a positive coronavirus test, it is imperative that teams keep their reserve drivers ready to step up if needs be.

Four-time F2 race winner Aitken has contested several F1 tests before but is yet to sample the Williams FW43 chassis being campaigned this year.

The post Jack Aitken to make FP1 debut with Williams at Styrian Grand Prix appeared first on Formula Scout.

Many of the British drivers in the iRacing-based championship adopted the NHS livery as a tribute to the United Kingdom’s front-line workers in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic as they missed the weekly public applause due to racing.

The event itself was marred by multiple large accidents, and featured the debut for Formula 1-bound Nicholas Latifi.

The 64-car grid was split into two four-lap heats after qualifying, with the top 22 from each heat progressing to the eight-lap feature race.

Heat one started with a colossal incident that involved more than half of the field, including poleman Nico Varrone. Only a handful made it out unscathed, but iRacing enabled them to immediately relocate to pitlane and undergo repairs.

That left former Formula Renault Eurocup racer Ramez Azzam to dominate, while Bearman – this year’s IAME Winter Cup winner on his X30 Senior kart debut – finished ninth. It left those involved in the incident to fight for the final spots, with the likes of Latifi, Joe Turney, Liam Lawson, Felipe Drugovich and Sacha Fenestraz making it through.

Indian talent Muhammad Ibrahim started heat two on pole but ran wide on lap one at the fast kink. That put Eduardo Barrichello in the lead, although he had Johnathan Hoggard and junior karter Kacper Sztuka to contend with.

Barrichello won narrowly from Sztuka, while Ibrahim was involved in contact with Ferrari junior Dino Beganovic and Formula E racer Oliver Rowland at Turn 5. Hoggard rounded out the top three in a heat that also had the likes of Ed Jones and Franco Colapinto making it through. Ibrahim narrowly made it, while Rowland and the heavily damaged Ferdinand Habsburg did not.

The feature race was messy from the off, with a spectacular pile-up immediately splitting the field in two. Barrichello got the jump on Azzam, who was shortly punted off by Renault junior Caio Collet. Red Bull Jak Crawford then claimed second before spinning off.

It became a common theme for the driver in second to hit trouble. GT4 driver Alfred Nilsson rear-ended Drugovich while scrapping over second, gifting Varone that spot. Bearman moved into third, while Latifi and Fenestraz flew up into the top 10.

The safety car was controversially called out on lap five while Barrichello was controlling the race. After several laps under yellow, Varrone accidentally spun Barrichello, who hit another car as he rejoined the track. He was able to reclaim his lost positions ahead of a one-lap victory shootout.

The pair collided again at the restart, and sank down the order. Bearman ended up fighting former British Formula 4 racer Turney, who had gained 31 spots from his starting position, for the lead and held on to win by 0.173 seconds.

Eurocup racer Yves Baltas was third, ahead of former British Formula 3 racer and Formula 2 engineer Stefan De Groot,?Fenestraz, Latifi, Cameron Das, Paul Aron, Bart Horsten and Sztuka.

The post Karter Ollie Bearman wins Dallara F3 Esports race in NHS tribute appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Carl Bingham / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Nicholas Latifi’s six wins from five years in the step below Formula 1 may not have set the world alight, but it’s a lot of hard work that has taken the Canadian all the way from a reluctant racer to a Williams F1 seat

Going into his fourth full season in Formula 2, it was clear to then-23-year-old Latifi that 2019 would be his last honest shot at earning himself an F1 seat, and therefore the more important year of his career when it came to on-track performance.

He had already secured a reserve driver role with Williams – his third F1 team in three years as a tester – the previous December before securing his F2 future via a continuity deal with DAMS, which he had raced at exclusively since 2016.

Latifi’s second season with the team resulted in an impressive fifth in the points and only one less podium than Prema’s dominant champion Charles Leclerc. Over the season’s second half, he was only outscored by Russian Time’s Luca Ghiotto and finished just 13 points short of pre-season title favourite team-mate Oliver Rowland.

The next year got off to a bad start though, with Latifi contracting an infection that hospitalised him and meant he missed his first F1 tests with Force India and more importantly the first pre-season F2 tests with the new Dallara F2 2018 car. He did recover in time for the second three-day test, and also tasted the car in the snowy shakedown day at Magny-Cours. However, he was still at some disadvantage going into the season.

Latifi attributes this specifically to not knowing what changes he needed to make to his driving style to match the demands of the car, with Magny-Cours and Bahrain not entirely representative of most F2 circuits. Given the extremely limited running time for F2 on F1 weekends, the missed test equated to several rounds’ worth of knowledge his rivals had in hand too.

Latifi was on the podium by the fourth race of the season, but he was scoring small points and when his pace did improve in the second half of the season – outpacing F1-bound team-mate Alex Albon – he was not getting the finishes to show for it.

Ninth in the standings was a disappointment, but it set Latifi up for a stronger 2019 and ultimately his own promotion to F1 this year. Had Dallara’s last-generation GP2 car been used in F2 in ’18, Latifi believes he could have been champion and made it to F1 a year earlier. However, racing the replacement car better prepared him for racing an F1 car with similar characteristics. His logic: a better-prepared F1 rookie has an increased chance of making it to a second season in the series.

Winning the F2 title was therefore firmly on Latifi’s mind going into 2019; a stark contrast to the Canadian’s younger self.

His motorsport interest did not extend beyond his wider family visiting their country’s grand prix every year when he was at the age that most future professionals start karting, and it was his wealthy father (who has had the financial means to fund his son all the way to F1) who got the thrill for speed first when he booked track experience days in sportscars. The instructor there also had an indoor karting track within a commutable distance of Latifi’s Toronto home, and when the younger Latifi got behind the wheel it was still only as a bit of family fun.

As he entered his teenaged years, Latifi took karting on as a hobby and started setting laps at a more local track. He was talent spotted by the track owner, who repeatedly pushed him to take up the racing bug properly. There was a surprising amount of resistance to this from the adolescent Latifi, who karted solely for fun.

Eventually his stubbornness broke, and he transferred to four-stroke karts on outdoor tracks. His first big race in these karts took place on slicks in the rain, and despite multiple spins this was how he got hooked to racing.

Photo: Cody Schindel

Aged 14 he took on national competitions and was runner-up to future car racing rival Lance Stroll in Rotax Junior karts. A year later he was racing in the USA too, and after that he was old enough to make the switch to junior single-seaters in Europe.

He made his single-seater debut at the start of 2012 in the Skip Barber Winter Series, winning on his debut at Homestead-Miami Speedway, then banked some experience in a GT car at Daytona before heading to Italian Formula 3.

At the same time he remained in karts, wanting to add to the three years of competitive experience under his belt and try to add some trophies before embarking on a single-seater career. By sticking with his passion for one more year he did just that, winning the Florida Winter Tour in Rotax DD2 karts. To this day, Latifi still has a KZ kart that he uses for training.

The late start was a disadvantage in karting, and even more so in single-seaters according to Latifi. An analogy Latifi regularly uses is that early-starters in karts (such as Max Verstappen) learn how to drive and race as if it were their first language, and that it is a notably more difficult and slower when learning those skills at a later age when everyone else is already fluent.

In effect, Latifi literally learned much of what he practices on-track from paper and theory-based work rather than racking up mileage from a young age to build up the understanding of the intricacies of car control and mechanical sympathy.

For context, while no F1 driver now started as late as Latifi, it was a very different picture in the past. F1, rally and sportscar legend Sir Stirling Moss began his motorsport career aged 19. Emilien Denner, currently competing in the Toyota Racing Series, is 17 years old and like Latifi had only three years of competitive karting experience prior to stepping up.

Latifi’s first year in F3 included one win at Vallelunga and seventh in the points with BVM Racing and JD Motorsport.

For his second year of car racing he switched to the British and FIA European F3 championships with Carlin, and warmed up for them with a shot at the Toyota Racing Series. He took the only two pole positions of his career to date in British F3’s visit to Spa-Francorchamps, and his one podium helped him to fifth in the standings.

His European campaign included six top-10 finishes, in a grid packed with talented drivers, and he proved he was a quick learner with seventh place in Zandvoort’s Masters of F3 and ninth in the Macau Grand Prix.

Latifi returned to European F3 in 2014 with Prema, and kicked off the season with his first podium. He didn’t return to the rostrum though and slipped to 15th in the points, but once again redeemed himself in Macau with fifth place.

The desire to speed up his learning curve via extra mileage led to some interesting side-steps in ’14, including an impressive Porsche Carrera Cup GB cameo. He started with four wins in Ferrari Driver Academy’s entry-level Florida Winter Series, then late in the year took on Formula Renault 3.5, grabbing a podium while skipping a European F3 round, and made his GP2 debut.

F3 was dropped for 2015, and while the results never made headlines, Latifi was no slouch. He came 11th in primary programme FR3.5 and Carrera Cup GB, notched up more GP2 starts, raced in Indy Pro 2000’s Winterfest and returned to karts.

At the end of the year he had his first experience of DAMS in GP2’s post-season test, and was fastest of all.

Photo: Sam Bloxham/GP2 Series Media Service

Photo: Zak Mauger/FIA Formula 2

Latifi’s DAMS engineer Antoine Voyet said the Canadian was “a question mark” when he joined the team, but an impression had been set on him in the duration of their first test together, and he was signed for the 2016 season not long after.

Their working relationship kicked off with fourth place in qualifying and a second place finish at Barcelona, which also marked Latifi’s first race weekend with F1 connections after signing to become Renault’s test driver. There were only three other points finishes that season, but he held on to his coveted DAMS seat, and stayed loyal to the team.

Known for being an incredibly calm person, Latifi’s off-track demeanour transferred to the cockpit as his experience grew over the next three years and the number of high-pressure situations he faced increased as he raced more frequently at the front.

Voyet puts these improvements down to Latifi being a good student, and that both parties learned during their partnership. Latifi also identified the championship’s car change and his 11 F1 free practice appearances.

“I definitely think I wasn’t helped that [in 2018] it was a new car I missed half of testing,” Latifi said in an F2 podcast during last season. “Those three full days of testing probably would have accelerated the kind of switch-on in my mind that ‘OK, I need to change [my driving]’.

“I’m happy I made the break [with the F2 2018], as it could have very well been that I continued as I was and never arrive at that turning point. If [the car] had stayed the exact same, I was very confident of my chances to fight for the ’18 title.

“Lets say hypothetically I did win the ’18 title [with the ’17 car], then hopefully I would’ve been in F1. But if I then drive a F1 car that had the same handling tendencies and problems, like I was struggling with at the beginning of 2018, then I would never have been able to overcome that in a F1 situation.

“All the track time I have in an F1 car has been really beneficial, also supporting and helping F2. It’s extra track time, and it’s quite a tricky car to drive, so it’s been good to drive something different, adapting. That’s always good for driver development.”

It’s clear Latifi is still making, and needs to make, improvements in his driving. He conceded F2 title defeat early last year, a response based on prioritising earning the FIA superlicence points required to make it to F1, and throughout GP2/F2 he only made the front row three times – his 2019 grid average was 5.4 and over his 51 qualifying attempts he averaged 9.7.

In FR3.5 he also made the front row once, but averaged 10th on the grid. In Carrera Cup GB, where he had the least preparation, it was 5.5 – only bettered by two series with low grid numbers: British F3 (4.0) and FWS (3.5).

Despite these fairly damning statistics, it should be remembered that Latifi started 2019 with three wins in the first five races and was top of the F2 standings for the first third of the season.

It was a start he was particularly pleased with, bar a messy Monaco weekend that marked a switch in momentum to ART Grand Prix rival and eventual champion Nyck de Vries.

His next win came in a consummate feature race performance at the Hungaroring, and there were second place finishes at Silverstone, Sochi and Abu Dhabi. Latifi’s Williams F1 drive was announced prior to the season finale, having convinced the team he was worthy of a race seat from his free practice appearances, but it didn’t make the Abu Dhabi weekend any easier as the Canadian had to win the teams’ title for and say goodbye to the DAMS teams he’d spent several years with, and which had lost its founder Jean-Paul Driot several months prior.

Debuting with F1’s backmarker team will make it difficult for Latifi to make an impact, although 2018 F2 champion George Russell received considerable praise for his pointless rookie season with Williams last year. Russell will remain there as Latifi’s team-mate, and the highly rated Mercedes junior will be the best barometer to measure whether Latifi is deserving of a F1 seat for a second season in 2021.

Further reading
F2: Chasing the Dream series review

The post Why Nicholas Latifi’s rise to F1 is more remarkable than you think appeared first on Formula Scout.

Formula 2 has started the year with a documentary series on F1 TV following its 2019 season, focusing on the championship frontrunners and the impact that the black day at Spa-Francorchamps had on the paddock

For a show titled Chasing the Dream, there’s an inevitable focus on “living in a nightmare”, as series CEO Bruno Michel says it, due to the events at Spa-Francorchamps which resulted in Anthoine Hubert’s death and Juan Manuel Correa’s heavy injuries.

The five-episode F1 TV-exclusive series tackles the 2019 F2 season in chronological order, meaning the impactful Spa weekend – which is tackled with care – is kept to episode four.

This means the show begins with the Bahrain season opener, and the oft-repeated ‘F2 is the best single-make championship anywhere on Earth’. Sadly, the series’ scale of importance and speed isn’t shown enough, rather focusing on drivers’ home lives and Ross Brawn soundbites.

It’s an approach that would work with Formula 1 as the subject, given those drivers are already established characters, but viewers new to F2 need to invest more in the drivers’ on-track exploits before exposure to the mundane elements of their lives.

Arden’s Tatiana Calderon and DAMS’ Nicholas Latifi do make great on-screen impressions from the off, one for delivering a back-to-basics explanation of F2 better than Brawn’s and the other for showing down-to-earth charisma that F1 will get to enjoy in 2020.

Of the scant on-track action used, the race highlights are choppy in episode one and difficult to follow. This may be a case of editors having a tricky job tying live commentary to non-TV footage. Thankfully, the other episodes don’t suffer the same fate.

Photos: FIA Formula 2

Music is used almost constantly to illustrate the action, or dialogue, and Bahrain is dubbed with country and western riffs.

The narrative pauses for the first of several side-steps into drivers’ everyday lives across the series, with episode one’s example being ART Grand Prix’s Nyck de Vries in a headband lounging on a boat in Sneek and chatting about Christmas dinner with 2018 F2 champion George Russell. While it isn’t really a convincing example of “being a 24-year-old guy like everyone else”, de Vries gives insight into his motivations that will leave followers of his career reading between the lines.

The audience also gets to follow de Vries on his way into the paddock for round two in Baku, and it’s one of the rare instances where the series explores some gripping visuals and backgrounds, and utilises slow-motion on-track footage.

Being with the drivers inside a team truck, or the green room pre-podium (or even a minivan between paddocks at Silverstone later in the series) is another example of the series at its best as we get to see the drivers interact with each other. From a journalist’s perspective, it’s scenes like this that make you want to jump into the screen and straight into the paddock action.

Episode two begins with the Monaco round, and Arden driver Hubert’s at-home life is explored via a stay with his girlfriend. This is more effective than other similar segments, as once again it leans on interactions between the drivers and people that are close to them rather than isolated straight-to-camera pieces.

There are two big stories of the Monaco weekend, and the documentary surprisingly skips over the quirky tale of de Vries winning in Formula 3 driver David Beckmann’s overalls rather than his own after ART accidentally binned them.

Photo: Carl Bingham / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Hubert’s win is covered with far better context, and some beautiful shots of his post-race celebrations, before the episode takes an unexpected trip to the Canadian Grand Prix, albeit with good reason due to the presence of local Latifi and his ultimately significant Williams practice outings.

Rather than exploring the Canadian’s relatively unknown but interesting background story, the episode examines Virtuosi Racing driver Guanyu Zhou’s shoe collection in his London home and a brief round-up of the racing at the Red Bull Ring.

Episode three begins at Silverstone, and is the most exciting episode when it comes to watching cars on track. Luca Ghiotto (Virtuosi) and Jack Aitken (Campos Racing) have their charges to victories detailed in epic style, and with some much needed scale, and both drivers also share some personal thoughts which add to the feeling of being present in the action.

Calderon gets more time in the limelight, before the Hungaroring round is rushed in to the running time to free up the fourth episode for Spa-Francorchamps and Monza.

Many potential viewers will be more curious about this episode than any other, and it is a great tribute not only to Hubert, but to his Arden team and everyone working in F2, as it shows how painful it was to return to racing just a week later at Monza.

Contributions from significant F1 figures, including the series’ CEO Chase Carey, reflect how that weekend was painful for people in motorsport across the world, but its the use of interviews from Hubert’s team-mate Tatiana Calderon, F2 & F3’s head of communications Alexa Quintin and her boss Michel that instantly leave a lump in the throat.

Capturing Lewis Hamilton and Esteban Ocon’s shocked live reactions to the crash hits hard, and Arden F2 team manager Kenny Kirwan’s and Correa’s recollections of the immediate aftermath highlights how brave both were and still are – especially the latter given his involvement in the crash put him in excruciating physical pain and eventually a coma. The filmmakers cut the music for this episode, with a shot of a slowly closing garage door encompassing darkness telling a thousand words.

The solidarity of the paddock in Monza is shown just as strongly as the loss of Hubert at Spa.

Ending the series is an episode that focuses on the title battle, and some more revealing dialogue from champion de Vries. This time he’s joined by Latifi and Ghiotto in showing his true feelings in an unexpected way, as well as an encouraging chat with an upbeat Correa who’s still in rehabilitation from the injuries to his legs and lungs sustained at Spa.

Making the admittedly niche F2 into a documentary topic for the first time obviously comes with its difficulties, especially when trying to give 10 relatively unknown drivers some significant screen time when off-track. In doing so, the series goes some way to achieving its goal of telling the stories of commitment required to ‘chase the dream’, but also sometimes ignores the appeal of the on-track product of single-seater cars racing closely at some of the world’s top circuits.

The post F2: Chasing the Dream series review appeared first on Formula Scout.

10. Nicholas Latifi

Photo: Dom Romney / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Re-entry (16th in ’17)
Took four wins and second overall in F2 before F1 graduation

Compared to the drivers that graduated from Formula 2 one year ago, an air of ambivalence met the news that Latifi will step up to Formula 1 in 2020, but it’s easy to forget how strongly he started the season.

After a 2018 season that was hampered by illness, but ended with him comparing favourably to team-mate Alex Albon nonetheless, Latifi needed to prove a point in 2019 and do enough to secure his superlicence.

Yes, this was his fourth full year in the series, all with the same team, but his three wins in the first three rounds – the feature races in Bahrain and Barcelona and the Baku sprint – was a genuinely impressive haul, and one that put him 39 points in front of Nyck de Vries.

His lack of a pole position – not just this season but across his entire F2 career – has rightly been a cause for criticism. But it does mean that all four of his 2019 wins – he added another feature race win in Hungary – had to be worked for, and showed his prowess in racing situations.

Unfortunately, he undid most of his early hard work with a shockingly scrappy weekend in Monaco, and having been spun around by his team-mate in Austria, it took until Silverstone for him to get back on the podium. By then, he wasn’t sounding overly optimistic of reeling de Vries back in, and after another double non-score at Monza (after tangling with Guanyu Zhou), he effectively resigned all hope. Comfortable, no doubt, that he was on course for his F1 drive regardless.

Few will expect Latifi to trouble his new team-mate George Russell next year, but his 2019 wins proved that – helped by the guidance of the late Jean-Paul Driot – he’s grown from a driver with potential into a well-rounded racer.

9. Guanyu Zhou

Photo: Jerry Andre / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Up 25
Euro F3 graduate impressed as F2’s leading rookie

After an underwhelming Formula 3 stint where he struggled to justify his status as a Ferrari junior, Zhou looked like a different driver in 2019 as he stepped up to F2 in Renault colours and starred as the championship’s top rookie.

Helped by a strong team in Virtuosi, he was on the pace from the start as his fourth place in the Bahrain sprint race showed, and by Barcelona he led the feature race on merit and scored his first podium.

More followed in the Monaco and Paul Ricard sprint races, and his progress was confirmed when he beat veteran team-mate Luca Ghiotto in a straight fight for pole at Silverstone.

A bad start meant he finished third again in that race, and his ultimate lack of a win, and lack of obvious improvement over the rest of the season, was a little disappointing. But another podium in the Abu Dhabi feature race showed he hadn’t lost his way, either.

While he said he found the tyres to be the hardest thing to get used to, maybe born of his lost lead in Barcelona, he impressed with how well he did get to grips with them for a driver who came from European F3 rather than GP3.

That gives him a platform to build on next year, when the main target has to be the superlicence points that could turn the prospect of China’s first F1 driver into a reality.

Further reading
How Guanyu Zhou became F2?s surprise star rookie

8. Christian Lundgaard

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

No change
Best F3 newcomer further grew his reputation

Although Lundgaard wasn’t a factor in the FIA Formula 3 title fight, he was, unlike the main protagonists, a total newcomer at this level, with the exception of his one-off GP3 appearance in mid-2018.

Historically, Formula Renault graduates, such as Daniil Kvyat and Jack Aitken, took time to find their feet in GP3, but Lundgaard had no such problems as he beat Prema’s European F3 converts to win the opening race in Barcelona – at least for a few seconds, until he was given a penalty for a virtual safety car infringement that demoted him to second.

Such a performance was the sort of thing Esteban Ocon or Charles Leclerc could do in their early F3 days, except after an even greater leap in power.

On that form, Lundgaard would have been a serious title threat, but ART struggled surprisingly to repeat that pace with any sort of consistency. When the team was strong at the Hungaroring, Lundgaard seized his chance, taking the win from pole ahead of team-mate Max Fewtrell.

Another pole position came in the hectic qualifying session at Monza, but an early tangle with Lirim Zendeli ultimately meant he would score no further points, and he finished sixth in the standings. A further sign of his ability came in Macau though, when he finished third in the qualifying race behind Juri Vips and Robert Shwartzman, and fourth in the main event.

His move up to F2, firstly for Abu Dhabi with Trident and then for 2020 with ART, is a strong sign of Renault’s belief in Lundgaard’s talent, and one that could give it a headache if he impresses again next year.

7. Anthoine Hubert

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Up 2
Rookie shone with two special wins before fatal crash

It would be all too easy to inflate Hubert’s position as a result of his tragic loss in the horrendous Spa F2 crash. But the simple truth is that he was already on course for a place in this top 10, having impressed many with his performances in his rookie season.

It would not be an exaggeration to suggest that the F2 paddock lost its single greatest prospect on that dreadful day.

That’s not necessarily a status he held in the eyes of many at the start of the year, even as the reigning GP3 champion. And his chances of a strong campaign looked slim as he and the Arden team struggled for speed through pre-season testing. But Hubert arguably made a greater impression over the races that followed than at any previous point in his career, as?F2’s complexities played to the same strengths that led to comparisons with his hero-turned-mentor at Renault, Alain Prost.

He wowed in his first race as he went from 11th to fourth without a working radio, and such storming race drives from further back on the grid would soon become the norm. There was 15th to sixth in Barcelona, and then a win in the Monaco sprint race as he kept Louis Deletraz at bay, just. He repeated the feat next time out, on home soil, again after qualifying 15th.

Together with new partner HWA, Hubert was helping to drive the Arden F2 effort forwards, and in Austria he somehow joined de Vries on the front row. The points he scored for fourth the next day would be his last.

Despite the lack of funds that led him to Arden in the first place, F2’s top teams were chasing Hubert for 2020. That in itself speaks volumes of the impact he made in his last, unfinished, season.

Further reading
How Hubert was enhancing his reputation in the F2 pack
Anthoine Hubert: 1996-2019

6. Jack Aitken

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Up 36
Bounced back with three giant-killing F2 wins?

After his tough debut F2 campaign with ART in 2018, few rated Aitken’s chances of bouncing back in 2019 with Campos Racing, but that’s exactly what he did.

Following his third win of the year in the Monza sprint race, it looked like he could have the momentum to snatch second place in the standings. To simply be in that position was an achievement in itself, even though his season ended with a whimper and fifth place overall. Though of a similar age, Aitken was fighting with drivers with more experience in F2, and thus a better knowledge of everything that it takes to succeed in the series.

Aitken firmly outperformed what Ghiotto had achieved at Campos the previous season, with he and engineer Jan Sumann working together to help push the team forward. Qualifying was still a weak point (although some progress was shown by the third places in France and Belgium) but Aitken didn’t let it get him down, instead placing confidence in his ability to move forward in the races.

Baku provided the best opportunity for that, and Aitken seized it to take the feature race win, as well as a sprint race podium. Further feature race podiums came with second in Spain and third in France and Hungary. Brilliant starts, great tyre management and bold racecraft were keys to his success, and all on show in his home sprint race win at Silverstone. His winning move on Louis Deletraz as rain began to fall was the overtake of the season.

His win in the Monza sprint race – an emotional one dedicated to his Renault colleague Hubert – was somewhat different, as he defended from behind after starting from pole. It put him fourth in the standings, just 13 points behind Latifi and two behind Ghotto, so he was unlucky to end up 55 behind, especially after being taken out by an errant Nikita Mazepin from a front row start in the Sochi sprint.

Further reading
How Campos and Jack Aitken became a force in Formula 2

5. Jehan Daruvala

Photo: Colin McMaster / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Up 43
Rivalled illustrious team-mates in dominant Prema F3 side

Daruvala was expected to play third-best to his highly-rated, Ferrari-supported team-mates after joining Prema for FIA F3. The final championship standings would ultimately play out that way, but he was only a point behind Marcus Armstrong, and arguably provided a much stronger threat in the title race, briefly leading it at one stage as he and Robert Shwartzman proved hard to separate.

The first round at Barcelona went just as the form guide suggested, with his reversed-grid race victory coming only after he’d trailed home in seventh in race one. But then he was only narrowly beaten (by Jake Hughes) to pole at Paul Ricard, and took a second straight win in the race.

Having beaten Shwartzman in Austria, finishing second to Juri Vips at Silverstone put Daruvala two points ahead at the top of the standings, but a needless late tangle with Pedro Piquet in race two was costly, and he lost further ground at the Hungaroring.

He took pole at Spa, but finished only third as Piquet pulled away and Shwartzman overhauled him for second. He was second to Shwartzman once more at Monza, but that was enough to mean it was he, and not Vips or Armstrong, that would take the title fight down to the final round.

Daruvala was no match for his team-mates in Sochi but would still have taken a deserved second in the standings had he not had to start the race from the pits after inadvertently triggering the throttle learning procedure on the grid.

An injury kept him out of Macau and the Abu Dhabi F2 test, but it would be a surprise if he didn’t make the step up after his strongest season yet in cars.

4. Marcus Armstrong

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Photo: Jerry Andre / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Up 2
Second in FIA F3 a well-earned reward after trying season?

The expectations on Armstrong heading into FIA F3 probably exceeded his experience, but after a year in which nothing ever seemed to go his way, second in the standings and a convincing performance in the final round left a positive impression.

Being pipped to the Toyota Racing Series title by compatriot Liam Lawson at his third attempt was a difficult start to Armstrong’s year, and in FIA F3 he struggled to gain the upper hand over his Prema team-mates. Being turned around by Hughes while fighting for second at Paul Ricard was the first of many missed opportunities.

At the Red Bull Ring he dominated Friday, but pole became third in the first race after the “Indy 500”-style DRS-fest he expected turned out to be anything but. He was set to overcome an almighty battle with Shwartzman on the last lap to win race two when they collided and he came off worst.

By now, Armstrong was playing catch up in the title race, and he never really had the pace again to make amends. The race two wins at the Hungaroring and Spa were well-executed recoveries from qualifying nightmares, but luck seemed to be against him again at Monza when he was penalised for a safety car infraction after finishing second in a Prema 1-2-3, ending any lasting hopes.

The most impressive thing about Armstrong’s season was not his pace, but the 19-year-old’s refusal to let his head drop in the face of so many disappointments. He never stopped fighting, as shown by his Sochi performance, where he went from third to first to fourth and back to first to defeat Shwartzman in race one, and was second in race two to snatch championship runner-up honours from Daruvala.

The Macau Grand Prix was possibly peak Armstrong, who was rapid and on top in qualifying two until he hit the barriers, and then got held up at the start of the qualifying race, thwarting any possible fightback. In the main event he worked his way through to eighth, but even then, his old nemesis Lawson came from even further back to beat him.

While it will only be his fourth full year in cars, Armstrong’s step up to F2 for 2020 is entirely logical, and with an ART car underneath him, the expectations will be high once again.

3. Juri Vips

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Up 2
Red Bull junior took the fight to Prema in FIA F3

Some feared that Vips wouldn’t be able to demonstrate his talent in FIA F3 after being placed by Red Bull at Hitech GP, and – thanks to the sheer dominance of Prema that transpired – it could be argued that he was indeed held back. But the Vips-Hitech combination was the only one to make the Estonian’s old Formula 4 squad sweat.

The promise was there in Vips’ race pace in the first couple of rounds, but it wasn’t until the Red Bull Ring that he and Hitech got qualifying sorted, and he converted third on the grid into a race one victory over Max Fewtrell and Armstrong.

It could hardly have been more timely, coming at his backer’s home venue in a week where former team-mate Dan Ticktum was dropped from his position higher up in the Red Bull pecking order. Vips was being talked about as a serious contender for a 2020 F1 race seat.

He followed it with another win at Silverstone, this time from pole as Hitech produced its strongest performance of the season in its own back yard. It put him within eight points of eventual champion Shwartzman, and it felt like he had the momentum on his side.

But points were dropped in a scruffy second race, and the rest of the season proved tougher than expected. Hurt by a lack of pace and several incidents, he didn’t even make it back onto the podium until he won the last race in Sochi from reversed-grid pole.

Question marks hang over that decline and whether it was him or the car or a combination of both, but Vips provided a reminder of his talents in Macau. Well-fancied after his impressive 2018 debut, he was the strongest driver of the weekend and was unfortunate not to win, instead adding his name to the long list of favourites who’ve been slipstreamed out of victory at a safety car restart.

While the rest of the FIA F3 stars step up to F2, Vips is set to be moved to Super Formula by Red Bull after contesting the final round. It would be a huge shame if such a talent is wasted trying to perform in such a tough series, but hopefully, his strong post-season testing form is a sign he can cut it.

Further reading
Could Juri Vips be Red Bull’s next shock F1 promotion?

2. Nyck de Vries

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Up 11
Mated speed and maturity to clinch deserved F2 title

A lot has happened since 2012, when de Vries first made our Top 50 in his first season of car racing. For one, Max Verstappen has graduated from karts, made it to F1 and had nearly four seasons racing for wins with Red Bull. Yes, the road to this point was a long one, but that does little to take away from de Vries’ 2019: a triumphant crowning of his tumultuous career in junior single-seater racing. In fact, it probably made it all the sweeter.

He didn’t burst out the blocks like Latifi, a single sprint race win from the first three rounds arguably a disappointment. But his win in Monaco was well-deserved for his sheer speed there over the years, and the one that followed at Paul Ricard put him into a points lead that never really even looked threatened.

His season was not perfect. Tyre management was still a weakness on occasions – his lost win at the Red Bull Ring springs to mind – and as with his predecessor George Russell, the de Vries-ART combination was not as fast at some circuits (like Silverstone) as others.

The way in which de Vries actually secured the title was the standout part of his season. After the summer break, he began the latter part of the season by taking pole at Spa, a place where he was expected to go well on the account of past form. But after the tragic events of Saturday in Belgium, he never got to capitalise on his advantage.

A few days later at Monza, de Vries was excluded from qualifying after running out of fuel in a frantic session, sending him to the back of the grid. While rival Latifi got involved in contact, de Vries charged through to third place, a result he repeated on Sunday with a good slice of luck. He sealed the title with a long-awaited return to the top step in Russia.

With a point to prove after finishing fourth in 2018 as the top three went to F1, de Vries felt more at ease at ART than at Prema, and added a calmness and maturity to his game that was often missing in the past. Contributing to that perhaps was a total separation from his soured relationship with McLaren, instead joining forces with Mercedes for simulator work and, ultimately, a Formula E drive.

Given that he only finished 10 points behind Albon a year ago, added to the improvements he’s shown in 2019, de Vries arguably deserves his chance in F1 too. But with that Mercedes FE seat underneath him, and World Endurance squads also eyeing him after some impressive LMP2 runs, he’s got the potential to become one of the top professional racers around.

Further reading
The patience behind Nyck de Vries? long road to the F2 title fight

1. Robert Shwartzman

Photo: Carl Bingham / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F3 Championship

Up 14
Ferrari junior’s progression crowned with FIA F3 title

Shwartzman’s growth as a racing driver through his career to-date has been just as impressive as his increase in physical stature.

Under the guidance of the Ferrari Driver Academy, SMP Racing and his Prema team, he’s blossomed into a driver who won this year’s most competitive junior series with a consistency that few would have believed was possible from anyone at the start of the season.

Shwartzman was not champion because of his one-lap pace. His two poles, at the first and last rounds, were as many as anybody else achieved, but in the meantime, he couldn’t even get onto the front row. But like his Prema team, Shwartzman was at his devastating best in race-trim, and was almost always moving forward.

Aside from a solitary retirement, he finished every race inside the top eight, and all but one race in the top five. An outstanding record in a series with reversed grids.

Strong progress in Sunday races was Shwartzman’s strong suit, whether he’d won on the Saturday like in Barcelona, or finished fifth, like in Austria or at Silverstone. His consistency was most impressive in the first half of the season – five podiums in eight races and never outside the top five – yet this was when his points advantage over Vips and Daruvala was at its slimmest. But instead of crumble under the pressure as the year went on, Shwartzman just pulled away as his rivals made mistakes.

After the dream crowning on home ground in Sochi, he might conceivably have won in Macau too but for minor contact as the field funnelled through Mandarin.

A year ago, nobody had quite been sure what to make of Shwartzman’s late surge to third in the European F3 standings. Nobody can be in any doubt now that he’s one of the top few prospects below F1, and it’s surely only a matter of time – if he takes his form to F2 next year – before he’s in the top class.

Click here to view the rest of the 2019 Top 50

The post Formula Scout Top 50 Drivers of 2019: 10-1 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photos: FIA Formula 2

While history may not suggest the 2019 Formula 2 season was as thrilling or yielding as many Formula 1 stars as 2018, it was not short of exciting races or future racing professionals.

Nyck de Vries was one of many experienced drivers taking one final shot at the championship. He, along with the likes of Luca Ghiotto and Nicholas Latifi, had watched as star rookies like Charles Leclerc and George Russell had beaten them in the past.

However, 2019 was the year the momentum swung back in favour of the series veterans, becoming the first year since 2012 that a rookie has failed to win a feature race in F1’s leading feeder series.

That’s not to say F2’s 2019 grid wasn’t short of rookies with high potential. Reigning GP3 champion Anthoine Hubert dragged the struggling Arden outfit, with HWA support, to sprint race wins before the tragic events at Spa-Francorchamps.

It’s impossible not to assess the 2019 season without addressing the race that will, unfortunately, define it forever.

Hubert was an outstanding man both on and off track. He was a credit to motorsport, and there’s no telling what he would have achieved in the future. Juan Manuel Correa is continuing his recovery from the Spa crash, and plans an F2 return.

We’ve compiled our list of the top 10 drivers of the 2019 F2 season, taking into account each driver’s team and level of experience within the series.

Key Percentage of team?s points scored (TP), Qualifying average (QA), Feature race average points (R1P), Sprint race average points (R2P)

10. Mick Schumacher GERMANY Prema
12th in standings, 53 points (1 win, 2 fastest laps, 1 podium) – TP 78%, QA 8.3 (9th),?R1P 0.9 (16th), R2P 3.9 (8th)

No driver came into the season with more expectation and pressure than Mick Schumacher. Not only is he the son of F1’s most successful driver, but he was entering as the dominant (albeit controversial) reigning FIA European Formula 3 champion.

The season started well. He was top rookie in Bahrain qualifying and he converted that into reversed-grid pole with a solid debut drive. Pole only led to sixth place in the sprint race, but this was expected given his inexperience of the Pirelli rubber at one of the most tyre degrading circuits.

In Baku, he performed the first of what would become his 2019 party trick. He spun out at Turn 16 in the feature race but blitzed his way through the field to fifth place on Sunday, including a statement move on his Prema team-mate Sean Gelael.

Schumacher was unlucky in nearly every feature race, from been taken out by Gelael at Paul Ricard to his car breaking down in Sochi. He ended the year with a miserable 10 points from the 11 feature races, two fewer than Gelael scored.

His sloppy Monaco weekend was the low point. After a season’s best fourth in qualifying, he caused a red flag in the feature race by clipping Arden’s Tatiana Calderon at La Rascasse.

At the Hungaroring he took an impressive maiden win from pole in the sprint race, and his scintillating charge at the Red Bull Ring from the back to finish fourth was the highlight of his year. He only qualified outside the top 10 twice, and 12th place in the standings is far from representative of the raw speed and racecraft Schumacher demonstrated throughout the year.

Now he’s got a year of experience, he’ll go into 2020 knowing a strong second season will propel him first in line for a 2021 Alfa Romeo Racing F1 seat. Schumacher’s only problem is that he won’t have Gelael alongside him next year, but his main rival for that F1 graduation in Robert Shwartzman, and that the new wheel and tyre sizes will require a lot of learning once again.

9. Nobuharu Matsushita JAPAN Carlin
6th in standings, 144 points (2 wins, 1 pole, 4 fastest laps, 5 podiums) – TP 61%, QA 6.6 (6th), R1P 9.8 (5th), R2P 2.9 (11th)

Nobuharu Matsushita returned to F2 this year after an unsuccessful rookie Super Formula season, with the clear aim of obtaining enough FIA superlicence points – something he would fail to achieve.

It didn’t take him long to adapt to the new F2 car introduced last year, and he took his second-ever series pole just two rounds in. However, reliability woes left him leaving Baku with no race points to go with those earned in qualifying.

His car then blew up in spectacular style in Spain, leaving him with just six points from the first three rounds.

Second place in the Monaco feature race put Matsushita’s year back on track, and he took his maiden feature race success two rounds later at the Red Bull Ring with an example of his exquisite tyre management skills. He would repeat this to take his second win of the year at Monza, fending off Callum Ilott and Luca Ghiotto in brilliant style.

Matsushita wasn’t able to deliver the raw pace or consistency required to mount a serious title challenge. He certainly had the worst of Carlin’s bad luck – for example when he was brutally fired off the road in Sochi – but he quite simply wasn’t quick enough to earn the last few superlicence points he needed.

8. Callum Ilott BRITAIN Sauber Junior Team by Charouz
11th in standings, 74 points (1 pole, 2 podiums) – TP 67%, QA 6.4 (5th), R1P 3.0 (12th), R2P 3.4 (9th)

After a strong debut year, Charouz Racing System (in Sauber colours) seemed to take something of a step backwards in 2019.

Callum Ilott’s team-mate Juan Manuel Correa was the first of its rookie duo to impress, making the Baku podium in his first weekend racing on a proper street circuit. This perhaps served as something of a wake-up call for Ilott, who picked up his own first podium at Barcelona a fortnight later,

Then in Monaco, Ilott put the team on the front row of a feature race for the first time. Unfortunately his car turned itself off on the grid, and Ilott was never able to take the start.

At Paul Ricard, he rose from the back to nick the final point in the sprint race, and at his home race at Silverstone he was on sprint race pole, but inevitably tyre management woes meant he finished in fourth, 0.656 seconds off the podium.

Following Correa being sidelined after Spa, Ilott carried the sole flag for the team in stunning fashion one weekend later at Monza. He was fastest in qualifying, but again he fell to fourth against far more experienced drivers.

Ferrari junior Ilott rounded off his strong end to the season with a podium from ninth on the grid in the Sochi sprint race and a brace of top-five finishes in Abu Dhabi.

Evidently his inexperience with the tyres, as well as his team’s, made it difficult for Ilott to convert his strong qualifying into regular podiums. However, with his speed he should be an outside 2020 title threat with the more competitive Virtuosi Racing.

7. Sergio Sette Camara BRAZIL DAMS
4th in standings, 204 points (2 wins, 2 poles, 2 fastest laps, 8 podiums) – TP 49%, QA 5.4 (3rd), R1P 11.7 (4th), R2P 6.1 (4th)

Sergio Sette Camara was the highest driver on our F2 top 10 list last year not to graduate to F1. Therefore, it was safe to say he was one of the title favourites pre-season.

If you were judging his year off the season opener and closer, you’d expect Sette Camara had been in the title hunt all year. However, that was far from the case.

After a strong double podium in Bahrain, his season quickly derailed. He spun behind the safety car in Baku after apparent contact with Luca Ghiotto, and had to put in a great drive to recover to sixth place from the back in the sprint race.

He scored zero points at Barcelona, but did visit the Monaco podium. At Paul Ricard, he took his first 2019 pole but was beaten by ART Grand Prix’s Nyck de Vries to victory.

It wasn’t until the Red Bull Ring sprint race that he claimed his first win of the year, and even that came a day after clumsily running into the back of DAMS team-mate Nicholas Latifi.

Errors of that kind are not expected from third-year F2 drivers, perhaps a sign of frustration that Latifi had usurped him.

Sette Camara ended the year in stunning style in Abu Dhabi, with an excellent, measured drive to victory from pole in the feature race and a fighting run to third in the sprint.

Had he delivered more performances like that, de Vries might have had a more difficult time. Sette Camara’s 2020 plans are still under wraps, but if he sticks around in F2, he needs to find a way to make every weekend like Abu Dhabi.

6. Nicholas Latifi CANADA DAMS
2nd in standings, 214 points (4 wins, 3 fastest laps, 8 podiums) – TP 51%, QA 5.3 (2nd), R1P 12.8 (2nd), R2P 6.6 (2nd)

You’d be forgiven for wondering why the title runner-up is sixth on our list. Had we made the list after the first three rounds, then Latifi may well have taken #1.

He won three of the first five races, and only started on the front row for one of those. He was demonstrating exactly the type of risk management and racecraft needed to mount a title challenge.

However, his raw pace was never enough to match de Vries or Ghiotto. His last pole position came in British F3 six years ago, and he’s spent 4.5 seasons in GP2/F2 now. He can at least take solace he only qualified outside the top seven once this year.

A barren six-race run mid-season stumped his title challenge, and he just didn’t have enough to take the fight with de Vries to the wire. Going into the summer break he did take a racey Hungaroring win, but didn’t demonstrate that verve enough.

Compared to rivals Ghiotto and Sette Camara, Latifi did suffer a relative lack of bad luck, but part of that has to be a result of him successfully keeping out of trouble.

Once he was confident he was in a strong enough position for a FIA superlicence, Latifi admitted to changing his priority from beating de Vries to the title to securing DAMS the teams’ crown, which he did with Sette Camara in Abu Dhabi not long after signing to drive for Williams in F1 next year. A lot can be read into what that approach says about Latifi.

In total he has amassed 99 starts, the fifth highest in the history of F1’s primary feeder series, and taken six wins in that time.

Importantly he did do a great job beating Sette Camara though, and although he’s got big financial backing, he has earned his place on the 2020 F1 grid. However, going up against George Russell in the same team won’t make for an easy debut.

5. Luca Ghiotto ITALY Virtuosi Racing
3rd in standings, 207 points (4 wins, 2 poles, 2 fastest laps, 9 podiums) – TP 60%, QA 5.6 (4th), R1P 11.7 (3rd), R2P 6.4 (3rd)

In terms of raw race speed, few could match the peaks Virtuosi’s Luca Ghiotto achieved in 2019. That was evident straight away in Bahrain when he came from seventh on the grid to win the sprint race and lead the championship for the first time.

He then ran into the back of Sette Camara in Baku under the safety car, and dropped from pole position to the back in dramatic style at Barcelona when a hit from Campos Racing’s Dorian Boccolacci added to a poor start.

Ghiotto then charged to fourth in one of the drives of the season. He took second in the sprint race, then in Monaco lost a vital podium to a minor technical infringement, and was penalised for a crash with MP Motorsport’s Mahaveer Raghunathan. His title hopes took another blow at Paul Ricard as he was wiped out of the feature race after contact with Correa.

He hit back in style in Austria, taking two second places, and won the Silverstone feature race. It was here where team-mate Guanyu Zhou provided the biggest challenge to his leadership. Virtuosi and DAMS had a clear advantage that weekend. Rookie Zhou took pole, but Ghiotto jad the lead into Turn 1, and went on to triumph in a thrilling battle with Latifi.

There was another star drive at Monza when he bounced back from a season-low 14th in qualifying to finish second on home soil, and won his final F2 race in Abu Dhabi using pace and superb tyre management skills.

His wheel-to-wheel skill will be missed as he moves to sportscar racing in 2020. It’s a crying shame his swansong year in F2 was so fraught with incidents and inconsistency.

4. Guanyu Zhou CHINA Virtuosi Racing
7th in standings, 140 points (1 pole, 2 fastest laps, 5 podiums) – TP 40%, QA 7.2 (7th), R1P 7.5 (7th), R2P 4.8 (6th)

The highest-placed rookie in the standings and the first-ever recipient of the Anthoine Hubert Award, Guanyu Zhou delivered solidly in his debut season.

Champions Russell and Leclerc have increased expectations for rookies, and Zhou is someone who came to F2 with no experience of Pirelli rubber, the weight of a nation on his shoulders, and a new manufacturer backer in Renault.

He had a brilliant barometer in Ghiotto alongside him, who quickly turned from teacher to rival such was his growth.

Even his development over the opening weekend in Bahrain was impressive. He qualified 17th but raced to 10th, then turned that into fourth in the sprint race.

Baku proved to be another learning exercise after some questionable car placement from Correa, but he was already leading races by the third round at Barcelona. He was beaten by Latifi and Aitken, but hung onto third to secure his first podium.

Zhou added two more podiums in successive weekends at Monaco and Paul Ricard, firmly establishing himself among the frontrunners. At Silverstone he then took his first pole, another milestone result for the Chinese driver.

He was back on the front row at Monza but made a rookie error when battling Latifi, which earned him a penalty. Redemption came in the sprint race by charging to fourth place from the back. Moreover, such mistakes were few and far between, and he arguably didn’t make any more of them than his far more experienced team-mate.

Zhou took his third and final feature race podium of the year in Abu Dhabi, and finished seventh in the standings. Satisfyingly for himself, he was well clear of Schumacher and Ilott, who had beaten him as Prema team-mates in F3.

A race win may have eluded him, but he produced numerous drives worthy of the top step of the podium. He’s likely to obtain that elusive victory if he remains with Virtuosi as expected for 2020.

3. Anthoine Hubert FRANCE Arden International
10th in standings, 77 points (2 wins, 2 podiums) – TP 100%, QA 10.2 (11th), R1P 5.1 (9th), R2P 4.5 (7th)

Photo: Joe Portlock / LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship

Having Anthonie Hubert in third place on our list, despite his weaker statistical record compared to some of the entries he’s above, might make it seem like his placing is skewed due to the events of Spa.

However, that could not be further from the truth. He was partnered with Arden, a team with a disappointing record in recent years. It was the ninth best scorer in 2018, with a pair of highly-rated drivers only 14th and 17th in the standings.

Despite fruitless pre-season testing, Hubert made an instant impression by storming from 11th to fourth in the Bahrain feature race – without a working radio.

Then there was the maiden win in Monaco, beating Carlin’s Louis Deletraz in a dramatic finish. His momentum appeared to have stopped at Paul Ricard with 14th in qualifying, but Hubert left the weekend with a second successive sprint race win.

One-lap speed wasn’t his or his team’s forte, but he still managed a stunning lap to qualify second in Austria. He fell to fourth in the race but it was another haul of points, while team-mate Tatiana Calderon failed to score or qualify higher than 17th.

Hubert had two pointless rounds at Silverstone and the Hungaroring, but such were the quality of his previous performances, he was already been courted for 2020 by a number of the top F2 teams.

That came as no surprise to anyone who’d followed Hubert not only in 2019 but throughout his career. From his textbook example of how to win a championship in GP3 the previous year to battling with fellow French stars Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly in karting. Anthoine Hubert will never be forgotten.

2. Jack Aitken BRITAIN/SOUTH KOREA Campos Racing
5th in standings, 159 points (3 wins, 1 fastest lap, 7 podiums) – TP 84%, QA 8.6 (10th), R1P 9.2 (6th), R2P 5.2 (5th)

Just like Hubert, Jack Aitken had to make do with a seat in a lesser-fancied F2 outfit. Once a frontrunning force at this level, Campos has lost its way in recent years without the resources of rivals, but the refreshed team was a race winner this year.

Campos wasn’t the only one licking its wounds, because Aitken was convincingly beaten by current Williams F1 driver Russell at ART last year, and in 2017 while they were GP3 team-mates.

But Aitken performed far better in a perceivably weaker team than during his time with ART. Perhaps with Campos’s full effort behind him and free from some top team pressure, he reminded everyone why he’s so highly rated by Renault.

Aitken was responsible for one of the overtakes of the season at Silverstone to pass Deletraz for sprint race victory, which was joined by the Baku feature race and Monza sprint race as wins for the 24-year-old.

The Baku performance, from eighth on the grid, involved Aitken expertly fending off de Vries while in the lead, and at Monza he came out on top in a thrilling tussle with Ilott and MP’s Jordan King, the latter whom is never an easy pass.

A poor final two rounds did little to tarnish Aitken’s stellar second season but did cost him fourth in the standings

Aitken was also consistently better than whoever Campos put alongside him. GP3 race-winner Boccolacci couldn’t match Aitken’s pace, and his successors Arjun Maini and Marino Sato didn’t even get close to the Brit or the points.

As with Sette Camara, it’s unclear but quite likely this is the end of the F2 road for Aitken, and if it proves to be, he can walk onto his next adventure with his head firmly held high.

1. Nyck de Vries?NETHERLANDS ART Grand Prix
1st in standings, 266 points (4 wins, 5 poles, 3 fastest laps, 12 podiums) – TP 96%, QA 2.9 (1st), R1P 15.4 (1st), R2P 7.0 (1st)

The start and end of Nyck de Vries’ title-winning season may have been disappointing, but there was little of that to be found pretty much everywhere else in-between.

Three wins in four races at Barcelona, Monaco and Paul Ricard mid-season gave him a point lead that he never relinquished. It wasn’t even a case of killer consistency or choosing caution in tight spots, just the simple fact that de Vries and ART was the fastest package this year.

Having said that, de Vries made a knack of avoiding incidents and credit must be given to ART for running such a reliable and efficient car and consistently executing strong race strategies.

Contrast this to de Vries’s 2018 season, where he lost potential wins in Azerbaijan, Spain and Monaco due to unforced errors. It’s a real sign de Vries has matured as a driver.

Five pole positions gifted him 20 points alone, and he converted the most important of those into a title-clinching win in Sochi. He was outside the top four in qualifying only twice, making it increasingly difficult for his title rivals to catch him.

The Dutchman has spent the last few years in the shadow of Leclerc, Russell and the likes of Norris who joined McLaren while he was still there, but he left Woking at the start of this year and made the most of it. The dominant way he won the F2 title made him an obvious pick for Mercedes-Benz’s Formula E team, and his LMP2 prototype performances in the World Endurance Championship have made him a Toyota sportscar target too. F1’s loss is definitely FE’s gain.

The rest…

Jordan King?was millimetres from making this list. Like Aitken and Hubert, he dragged underdog MP to the front of the field several times, taking two podiums on his way to ninth in the points – despite missing Monaco for the Indy 500.

Louis Deletraz was another to just miss out on our top 10 for the second successive year. He’s somehow still yet to win a race, thanks to losing in a photo finish with Hubert in Monaco, a beautiful overtake from Aitken at Silverstone and poor tyre management in Abu Dhabi. He compared well to Matsushita and is returning to Charouz in 2020 for a fourth year of F2.

Juan Manuel Correa put in one of the drives of the season in Baku – getting a podium on his first time racing at a proper street circuit. He followed it up with another second place at Paul Ricard. His plucky if inconsistent style proved effective.

Frenchman Dorian Boccolacci was outshone by Aitken but deserves another F2 chance, considering he spent the first half of this year fighting for his Campos future then dropping permanently off the grid after a Silverstone cameo with Trident.

Ferrari junior Giuliano Alesi?struggled on his graduation from GP3, but got better as the season went on. He ended 2019 with his season-best result of fifth, and was 15th in the standings for Trident. Expect a far better 2020 with HWA Racelab.

He’ll be partnered by series veteran Artem Markelov next year. The Russian made a welcome three-round return after briefly leaving for Super Formula, and earned a double points finish at Monaco with MP.

Sean Gelael?had statistically his weakest year at this level yet with just 15 points, and withdrew from racing at Silverstone.

De Vries’ ART team-mate Nikita Mazepin?was probably the biggest underachiever this year. He ran Hubert fairly close to the 2018 GP3 title but scored just 11 points in his rookie F2 season. He should stay on the grid in 2020, but it won’t be with ART.

As ever,?Ralph Boschung?came on and off the grid when his budget allowed. His string of three top-10 qualifying results to start the season was impressive but continued reliability issues once again limited his rewards to two points finishes.

Against all odds, Mahaveer Raghunathan?scored a point. But he also got enough penalty points to be banned for two rounds. He provided comic relief rather than a worthwhile sporting presence.?On the other hand, his pace had drastically improved by Abu Dhabi from his debut in Bahrain.

Alfa Romeo junior Tatiana Calderon?was poor all year, often only ahead of Raghunathan. A shame considering the flashes of speed she showed in GP3. As with team-mate Hubert, her races were usually stronger than qualifying, but it wasn’t enough.

Further reading
Why Red Bull should end its Super Formula experiment (October)
How Guanyu Zhou became F2?s surprise star rookie (August)
How Campos and Jack Aitken became a force in F2 (August)
How GP3 champ Anthoine Hubert is enhancing his reputation in the F2 pack (July)
The patience behind Nyck de Vries? long road to the F2 title fight (June)
Five things we learned from the 2019 Formula 2 season opener (April)

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