Photo: F4 Spain

Red Bull Junior Richard Verschoor?won the first ever Spanish Formula 4 race at the Navarra circuit.

The Dutch driver led from pole position to chequered flag, finishing up four seconds clear of?Alex Vartanyan?in a field made up almost entirely of drivers that are already competing in the similarly Koiranen-run SMP series.

Racing here for the Drivex team co-owned by Pedro de la Rosa, Vartanyan had slipped from second to sixth with a bad start but the Russian produced a fine fightback, passing the battling?Roope Markkanen?and?Jarno Opmeer?in one move.

SMP F4 leader Opmeer got ahead of Markkanen – one of six drivers entered by Double R Racing – to complete the podium.

Xavier Lloveras – the solitary?Spanish driver present – finished fifth ahead of?Tuomas Tujula and?Nikita Volegov.

Rasmus Markkanen – involved in race-ending contact for Juho Valtanen on lap one – ended up eighth, with Nordic Formula Renault 1.6 driver?Juuso Puhakka and?Tuomas Haapalainen completing the finishers.

Vartanyan later claimed pole position for the third and final race of the weekend in the second qualifying session.

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Photo: SMP F4

Jarno Opmeer scored his fourth win from sixth starts to boost his SMP Formula 4 Championship lead in the first race of the Max Verstappen Race Days event at Zandvoort.

It was Verstappen’s fellow Red Bull athlete?Richard Verschoor on pole once again, but he again got into difficulty in the race with a poor start relegating him to sixth.

Rasmus Markkanen meanwhile beat Opmeer into the lead from third on the grid, but the Dutch driver would pass the Finn on lap two and won by almost six seconds.

Verschoor charged his way back up to second, relegating Markkanen to third ahead of twin brother Roope Markkanen.

Xavier Lloveras was fifth ahead of?Tuomas Tujula, who was signed this week by Double R Racing to also take part in Spanish F4.

Alex Vartanyan beat?Juho Valtanen to seventh, with?Danny Kroes ninth and?Nikita Volegov taking 10th from 15th on the grid.

Verschoor later took another pole position for the third race of the weekend.

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Photo: SMP F4

Seven drivers have been named to contest the 2016 SMP F4 championship, expanding the field into a lineup of 12 entries.

Ivan Matveev and Nikita Sitnikov will return to the championship after taking?eighth and ninth in?their rookie seasons respectively, both securing a podium finish.

Roman Lebedev took part in last year’s penultimate round under Georgian banner and he is set to return for more.

In addition, three?Russian karting graduates will make the step up to single-seaters, led by SMP-backed?Artem Petrov.

The 16-year-old Russian was a competitive KFJ participant last year, having won the Vega Winter Trophy and finished sixth in the World Championship.

He is joined by fellow junior-level karters Nikita Volegov and Gleb Zotov.

Finally, Cyprian Vladimiros Tziortzis will graduate to the series from Formula Russia.

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