Photo: Macau Grand Prix

The FIA has published the provisional entry list for this year’s Macau Grand Prix, with two-time winner Dan Ticktum the biggest name set to compete.

Ticktum was the victor in 2017 and ’18 with Motopark, and then finished 13th in 2019 – the last time the race ran for Formula 3 cars before this year – with the Rodin Carlin team.

He rejoins them for his return to the race and to junior single-seaters, since he has been racing in Formula E for the last two years. His team-mate in Macau will be Formula 2 racer and Red Bull junior Zane Maloney, with Carlin yet to name a third driver.

Richard Verschoor suceeded Ticktum as Macau GP winner and has already been announced as attempting to defend his FIA F3 World Cup crown with Trident, along with F2 rival Roman Stanek.

Also stepping down from F2 to race in Macau is Red Bull junior Isack Hadjar, who along with Williams junior Luke Browning will form part of Hitech GP’s line-up. It too is yet to announce its third driver.

In total 14 of this season’s FIA F3 full-timers will be racing. The champion and runner-up are skipping Macau, but Paul Aron – who came third in the standings – will be driving for Prema alongside with Gabriele Mini and Dino Beganovic.

Drivers arriving from other series to tackle the challenge of Macau include Euroformula champion Noel Leon at Van Amersfoort Racing) and McLaren’s new Formula 4 champion Ugo Ugochukwu who will be a total newcomer to F3-level racing when he lines up on the grid with Trident.

GB3 racer Max Esterson and Formula Regional European Championship driver Matias Zagazeta will both race for Jenzer Motorsport.

PHM Racing, one of FIA F3’s 10 teams, is not contesting the Macau GP.

Macau Grand Prix entry list

The post Two-time winner Ticktum headlines 2023 Macau GP entry list appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

The short-lived three-race format put more emphasis on scoring points in sprint races, but then improved qualifying form from the champion meant feature race form won him the title

With an unprecedented five poles in a row and four feature race wins, Oscar Piastri’s scale of improvement from his 2020 FIA Formula 3 title to take the F2 crown as a rookie in 2021 was simply monumental.

His upturn in qualifying form, after not making the front row once in F3, made him the driver to beat on one-lap pace in F2 this year and that’s no easy feat given how difficult the Friday sessions are.

The single free practice session takes place in wildly different track conditions to qualifying, provides only one or two laps of truly representative running if the softest tyre compound is used (which is not usually the case), and both sessions are often interrupted by yellow and red flags.

The poles themselves are impressive, and Piastri began his season with a seventh place in Bahrain qualifying. That made him the second highest placed rookie behind MP Motorsport’s Richard Verschoor in fifth, while in Monaco it was another rookie in Theo Pourchaire (who did contest the final two rounds of 2020 in Bahrain) who outpaced Piastri by 0.458 seconds to take pole. Baku also went a rookie’s way, in this case Liam Lawson who led a Hitech GP one-two while Piastri was in third.

That meant his average grid position over the season was 2.3, significantly higher than next-best Guanyu Zhou who averaged 4.6. Compared to 2020 it’s a big leap too, as last year’s champion Mick Schumacher had an average starting spot of 7.9 and his closest rival Callum Ilott topped the table with 3.4. Christian Lundgaard was the top rookie with 6.8.

Grid positions don’t factor in dominant performances like Pourchaire’s in Monaco, nor the split group qualifying format used there, so using absolute pace is a better way of seeing who was fastest on average over the 2021 season. And this only makes Piastri’s performances look all the more impressive.

Qualifying ‘supertimes’

The post Who was really the fastest driver in Formula 2? appeared first on Formula Scout.

20. Tim Tramnitz

New entry • F4 runner-up in both Germany and Italy with nine wins

Photo: ADAC

Photo: ADAC

In any other year, Tramnitz’s second season in Formula 4 would have been rightly heralded as outstanding. He added five wins in his home ADAC series to four in the Italian championship to secure the runner-up spot on both sides of the Alps. Only one other driver won more than twice across the two series. Unfortunately for Tramnitz that driver was Ollie Bearman, who took an incredible 17 victories.

Tramnitz started the year impressively, with two wins and a second place in the Italian opener at Paul Ricard. By the time he returned to Italy after skipping the following Misano round to focus on his home series, Bearman was in the middle of his stunning summer winning streak. Tramnitz took two more wins at the Red Bull Ring, one a brilliant drive back through the field in the wet, but had too much work to do to haul in Bearman’s massive points lead. Nevertheless, his consistency as well as his pace still saw off a strong field for second place despite missing two of seven rounds.

After a difficult opening to the season in Germany, he rebounded strongly at Hockenheim (twice) and the Sachsenring, winning four times to get back in title contention. Once out front he was often simply untouchable. But his starts let him down too often, prompting the occasional questionable defensive chop across an opponent.

Formula Regional seems to be the most likely destination in 2022, and Tramnitz has already tested for R-ace GP and ART GP post-season. And continued success for this personable Hamburger would be a massive boost for German single-seater motor racing.

19. Hadrien David

Re-entry (37th in ’19) • Frequent frontrunner claimed second in FREC

Photo: FRECA

Photo: FRECA

Reinvigorated by the switch to R-ace GP, David proved to be Gregoire Saucy’s most consistent season-long challenger in the Formula Regional European Championship, securing the runner-up spot at the final round.

David went into the season with plenty to prove having been unceremoniously dropped by Renault/Alpine having netted a solitary podium finish in a poor 2020 Formula Renault Eurocup campaign. Though he only took two victories, one of which was inherited after Saucy’s disqualification, he did take another seven podiums and was on the pace everywhere.

Despite being the second-fastest qualifier (on average just 0.18% slower than 8-time pole sitter, Saucy), Monza was surprisingly his only pole position of the year. But he made perfect use of it as he executed a flawless lights-to-flag victory. At Monaco, where R-ace was simply invincible, he had to watch his team-mates take the plaudits after failing to convert his free practice pace into a front-row start.

There was plenty of ill-fortune: three times losing out on points finishes after first lap incidents. In a formula where passing is at a premium, he twice put in mesmeric drives after being forced to start at the back. In Barcelona, a track hardly renowned as an overtaking paradise, he climbed up to 12th from 34th, while at Paul Ricard he got up to tenth after starting from the pit-lane.

With his career momentum restored, there are now whispers of renewed junior academy interest. But without the budget to match his undoubted talent, a second season in FREC, rather than a merited graduation to FIA Formula 3, seems on the cards for 2022.

18. Frederik Vesti

Down 7 • ART switch in FIA F3 yielded fourth place again

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Vesti’s move from Prema to ART Grand Prix for his second FIA F3 season might have been against popular wisdom but it wasn’t surprising as he moved under the guidance of the Mercedes-AMG Formula 1 team, and the combination still seemed a potent one heading into the season – given that he and ART’s Theo Pourchaire had been the form duo at the end of 2020. It proved surprisingly difficult for the two parties to recreate that form together, particularly the storming race pace.

After a low-key start in Barcelona, it looked for a while like Vesti could yet be a serious thorn in Dennis Hauger’s side in the championship fight. Pole position for round two at Paul Ricard was wasted when he slipped back through the order in a wet race, but he made up for that by beating Hauger to victory in race three at the Red Bull Ring, where the Prema driver had otherwise looked untouchable.

It quickly fell apart thereafter, though. For the second year in a row, Vesti suffered a nightmare at the Hungaroring with a hydraulic issue forcing his retirement from race one, while his qualifying form also began to collapse – not helped by a DRS issue in Zandvoort. It was only in the final race of the year in Sochi that he returned to the podium on a Sunday with a great drive to split Trident’s top two.

He might not have often had the speed he wanted, but it was hard to fault anything about Vesti’s driving and he was super-consistent, missing out on points in only three races. His new backer will have expected a better championship challenge, but a move up to Formula 2 with ART still looks on for 2022 after a full three days of testing.

17. Richard Verschoor

Re-entry (33rd in ’19) • Impressed in round-by-round rookie F2 campaign

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

For the second year in succession, MP Motorsport took on a very impressive F2 rookie. Sadly, that successful relationship was severed before the season’s conclusion. Regardless, Verschoor had done plenty enough to impress this year.

The team didn’t quite have the same spark about it as it had in 2020 when they were taking wins from well down the order and having a few shock pole positions, but Verschoor had the ability and the knack to always be there or thereabouts, lurking at the fringes of the top 10 ready to pounce when the time was right. With F2’s funky format in 2021, this brought Verschoor into play quite regularly and he looked totally at home in the championship, the quietly-forgotten fourth super-rookie across the year.

Where Verschoor’s situation differed from many, however, was that he was racing not knowing if he would be in the car in the following round, and yet he was still delivering great drives. The vast gaps between events helped Verschoor have time, but despite a win at Silverstone holding off Marcus Armstrong and Dan Ticktum, his seat was eventually bought out.

Injury to Enzo Fittipaldi allowed Verschoor back onto the grid for the finale, and he showed exactly what he’s about by taking Charouz’s best feature race result of the year at the only time of asking. This guy deserves to be in F2 full-time in 2022 without the worries of budget.

16. Clement Novalak

Up 30 • Netted third in FIA F3 with consistent campaign

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

In a year where the format demanded consistency, Novalak was more consistent than anyone in FIA F3. His tally of 12 top-five finishes was unmatched even by champion Hauger.

If anything his sheer consistency hurt him, because he qualified between fifth and seventh for the first six rounds, then second for the finale, and thus never benefitted from the grid being reversed for the first race of the weekend.

• Feature: Why ‘Mr Consistent’ was too good at his strongest suit in F3

He was usually moving forwards in the reversed-grid races – only Hauger and Victor Martins were better at that – but never quite enough to win. He only twice started a race even in the first two rows: Zandvoort race two, where he was passed for the lead by Martins late on, and Sochi race three where he couldn’t find a way past team-mate Jack Doohan to win despite Trident’s efforts to engineer a safe switch while it sweated over securing the teams’ title.

Doohan demonstrated the peaks that a Trident-run car was capable of and Novalak couldn’t quite unlock the same turn of speed – which came as something of a surprise given he seemed to get more out of a midfield package during their rookie seasons in 2020. But Novalak’s points were crucial to the team dethroning Prema and third overall in FIA F3 is still an achievement to be proud of in his fourth year of car racing as he steps up to F2.

15. Logan Sargeant

Down 6 • Brought Charouz F3 team forwards with podiums and a win

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

It’s rare in motorsport that a driver has a title run with the standout team in a championship, only to move to the least successful team on the grid for the following year. It’s even rarer for such a scenario to take place in the junior categories.

Normally, that would be a total career killer, yet Logan Sargeant concludes 2021 with his reputation enhanced to the point where he’s an entirely-deserving F1 junior with Williams. Irrespective of his extensive experience, that’s pretty good going.

Sargeant produced some absolutely brilliant drives with the unfancied Charouz outfit this year in FIA F3 and was regularly there causing headaches for his old team Prema, as well as the other outfits that are proven winners in this championship.

The progress just kept coming and coming and by round three had taken the team’s first F3 podium, only to then lose it as one of nine drivers to get pinged for track limits. He was back on the rostrum in each of the next rounds, culminating in a superb reversed-grid race win at Sochi, before following that up with a fine fourth in the season finale to take him over 100 points and ensure he finished ahead of two of the Prema drivers in the standings.

For comparison, Charouz scored just five points in total in 2020. With Sargeant’s leadership, they scored 127 this year. A one-off F2 run followed in Jeddah with HWA and next year he gets a great full-season chance with Carlin.

14. David Malukas

New entry • Narrowly defeated in Indy Lights title duel

Photo: Gavin Baker Photography

Photo: Gavin Baker Photography

Malukas had all of the tools at his disposal to come out on top of a ferociously competitive Indy Lights championship in 2021 and came up slightly short. Regardless, the progress he has made and some of the drives he produced this year really impressed.

Driving with his father’s team HMD Motorsports, Malukas was able to push the Road to Indy’s GOAT, Kyle Kirkwood, to a final-race showdown at Mid-Ohio. He came out of the blocks quickly, but it was towards the middle of the year that he was able to really find his form. On an oval, he was outstanding, winning both of the races on one at Gateway.

• Feature: How Malukas gave Kirkwood the toughest task of his Road to Indy treble

During that run, he asserted himself as the one to lead the teams’ title push, ultimately coming up just shy despite top fours in all of the races in the second half of the season. If not for an incident in the opening race (with Kirkwood, funnily enough), then the outcome of the title race could have been slightly different.

Regardless, Malukas showed growth this year, filtering out many of the mistakes that hindered him in the past, and proving he is ready for a seat in IndyCar with Dale Coyne Racing w/ HMD next year. Coyne has field some strong rookies in recent years too, namely ’21 champ Alex Palou and a certain Romain Grosjean…

13. Gregoire Saucy

New entry • Unexpectedly dominant FREC champion

Photo: FRECA

Eight wins gave Saucy the inaugural post-merger FREC title by a comfortable 68 points. To say that his dominance was a shock would be an understatement. Even the driver himself could not put his finger on the precise reason.

Saucy clearly revelled in the ART Grand Prix environment, gelling perfectly with his engineers to extract the most from the car/engine/tyre combination. He was the first driver to master the peaky Pirelli tyres in qualifying, enabling him to take eight pole positions.

• Season review: No secret ingredient in Saucy success

Aside from a nightmare weekend in Monaco, he was never far from the front. Indeed, race one at Valencia was the only other race where he didn’t finish in the top 10. When not leading from lights to flag, he skilfully kept his nose clean in the crowded midfield.

Having never won a race in his single-seater career, once he took the chequered flag at Imola he could hardly stop winning, taking seven straight on-track wins either side of Monaco. He lost a win at Paul Ricard for a minor technical infringement but gained another at the Red Bull Ring after Colapinto’s track limits time penalty.

The unassuming Swiss believes his experience will prove an advantage as he steps up to FIA F3 with ART. Having just turned 22 he is hardly an “old man” but he will be up against far younger rivals. Yet as he himself argues, it is the results which count, and with the fastest overall lap time from the three-day post-season test at Valencia, another very strong season should not be discounted in 2022.

12. Juri Vips

Up 17 • Brilliant in Baku, unlucky elsewhere in first full year of F2

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

After a disrupted 2020, Vips was given the luxury of a full season in F2 this year. Unfortunately for him, it wouldn’t be smooth sailing.

Reliability problems plagued the Red Bull junior throughout the season. He was often the fastest man on track, but that would all be for nothing when issues with the car itself appeared. His season should have gotten off to a strong result in Bahrain, but gearbox problems denied him those results. He would later complain of a persistent gear changing issue that wasn’t resolved until late in the season.

The two victories Vips did claim in Baku, including one in the feature race, were both standout performances that should have launched a championship challenge. Partially due to reliability problems, that championship challenge would never come about, and he could only manage sixth.

Despite the problems, he comfortably beat team-mate Liam Lawson, who also praised Vips’ abilities and highlighted his data as helping him to his maiden pole position in Azerbaijan.

When it came to F1 silly season, Vips played little part, though that said more about the number of drivers Red Bull is trying to place at the moment than it does about Vips’ ability in and out of the car.

11. Dan Ticktum

Up 11 • Was one of F2’s form drivers even as F1 hopes evaporated 

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

There was the lingering suspicion that the Carlin package was capable of more in F2 this year, but Ticktum’s feature race podium tally was only bettered by Oscar Piastri and Guanyu Zhou and he was the third-highest scorer in sprint races.

The racecraft wasn’t up to Ticktum’s usual high standards, and a collision in Baku not only had collateral damage for his rivals but also undid a weekend where his pace could have earned him a dominant win and put him in contention to finish in the top three of the championship.

He did get a win on Monaco’s streets, inherited from a Lawson disqualification, and went on a brilliant charge to win the first Sochi sprint race. Clearly street circuits are still his forte, and he’s now found the budget to move to Formula E.

Ticktum had the fifth highest qualifying average across the F2 season, and was fifth on laps led and feature race points. It was race pace where he was more often top of the table, able to look after his tyres over a stint better than his rivals and particularly at the start of the season. That dropped in Jeddah, where Carlin was off the pace, but some strong overtakes meant he scored in all three races. 

The Formula Scout Top 50 Drivers of 2021 has been compiled by Alejandro Alonso Lopez, Bethonie Waring, Cian Brittle, Craig Woollard, Ida Wood, Peter Allen and Roger Gascoigne. Click here to view the rest of the list.

The post Formula Scout Top 50 Drivers of 2021: 20-11 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photos: Formula Motorsport Limited

What was expected to be the most open year of F2’s modern era was shaken up mid-season as Prema’s Oscar Piastri dominated, and 2021’s event format and stretched calendar made top 10 picks as tricky as ever

Ultimately, Formula Scout has come up with its list, with a unanimous pick for the top spot after analysing all of the various data and taking into consideration the respective performances of the teams as well as the drivers’ individual highs and lows. Each writer gave their top 10 and the average of those forms the basis of this list.

After the Abu Dhabi season finale we discussed season on our podcast, which you can listen to below or find on Breaker, Google Podcasts, Overcast, Pocket Casts, RadioPublic, Castbox, Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Virtuosi Racing’s Felipe Drugovich never really seemed to gel with the team’s on-track package after his highly-anticipated move there off the back of a brilliant 2020 with MP Motorsport (where he returns in 2022), but there were flashes that put him perilously close to making this list. Bent Viscaal single-handedly putting Trident on the podium twice and into ninth in the teams’ championship gained plaudits from one of our writers too.

However, there was a lack of love for race winner Marcus Armstrong (DAMS), and podium finishers Christian Lundgaard (ART Grand Prix), David Beckmann (Charouz Racing System and Campos Racing) and Roy Nissany (DAMS) to name but a few drivers with silverware from 2021 but no spot on our top 10.

Key Percentage of team’s points scored (TP), Average qualifying position (QA), Feature race points (FR), Sprint race points (SR), Laps led (LL)

10. Jehan Daruvala INDIA Carlin
7th in standings, 113pts (2 wins, 1 fastest lap, 5 podiums) – TP 41.5%, QA 7.9 (8th), FR 42 (8th), SR 71 (5th), LL 63 (3rd)

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

Cian Brittle (8th): After being so soundly beaten by Yuki Tsunoda last season, an improvement this year was expected for Daruvala, especially after he finished 2020 so strongly with a new engine. Yet this season seemed to be the opposite for the Red Bull junior, as he started well and faded away in the final rounds. He only managed three points finishes across the final three rounds, being outscored by team-mate Dan Ticktum by 24 points across those races when it had only been a 22.5-point deficit across the first five rounds. While this wasn’t a dismantling to the same extent as last year, he struggled to match Ticktum, specifically on race pace. He was also largely outperformed by Red Bull stablemates Liam Lawson and Juri Vips, so further improvement is needed going into his third season if, as testing has suggested, Dennis Hauger and Ayumu Iwasa expand the pool of Red Bull juniors in F2.

Peter Allen (9th): Daruvala made a step forward in his second F2 season, but not of the scale required to be the proper title threat he needed to be if he’s to be considered a serious F1 prospect on merit. Again he was second-best in Carlin’s line-up, unable to match Ticktum’s podium habit. Qualifying consistency was an obvious downfall: he was second to Piastri at both Monza and Sochi but was outside the top eight at five of the other six rounds. The redeeming feature of his season were his attacking drives in the sprint races where he made up more points from his starting spots than anyone aside from the potent Prema pair, although his two race wins came from the front row. More of that could be possible with his anticipated move to Prema next year, even if his Red Bull junior status is looking hard to justify at this point.

9. Ralph Boschung SWITZERLAND Campos Racing
10th in standings, 59.5pts (1 fastest lap, 2 podiums) – TP 66.5%, QA 7.9 (9th), FR 27.5 (11th), SR 32 (12th), LL 2 (13th)

Bethonie Waring (6th): Anyone who listens to the podcast knows Boschung has been one of the stars of the season to me. When making this list, one of the important factors to me wasn’t just how well they did, but how well they did compared to what I was expecting, and Boschung more than exceeded expectations. For sure, there is plenty of room for improvements and consistency was not his strong point, but when he was scoring they were decent points finishes. He didn’t appear out of his comfort zone when fighting with title contenders and more than deserved his two end-of-year podiums.

Alejandro Alonso Lopez (8th): The 2021 season was Boschung’s best to date in F2. The Swiss driver extracted the most out of his Campos-run car to qualify in the top seven in six out of eight rounds. His race results also improved considerably compared to previous years. Even though he got two podiums in the last two rounds, the highlight of his season has to be Monaco. Keeping the car away from the barriers in a very slippery track was key to scoring points in all three races. The negatives came at Monza and Sochi where two self-inflicted mistakes while running comfortably inside the top 10 prevented him from scoring more points. It will be interesting to see what he and Campos can achieve togerher in 2022, as both team and driver seem really comfortable with each other.

8. Richard Verschoor NETHERLANDS MP Motorsport/Charouz Racing System
11th in standings, 56pts (1 win, 1 podium) – TP 73.3% & 3.6%, QA 12.9 (15th), FR 30 (10th), SR 26 (15th), LL 32 (10th)

AA (5th): Verschoor has been without any doubts one of the sensations of this year’s midfield. He shined in the season opener, qualifying fifth and finishing fifth and fourth in races two and three, and his talent would be noticeable across the rest of the year. Silverstone was a strong weekend too, controlling race two from reversed-grid pole and coming very close to finishing third in the feature race. Not having his seat secured never seemed to be a problem for the Dutch, who was always fully focused when he was on track. It is also worth mentioning how quick he adapted to Charouz’s car in Abu Dhabi, after spending most of his single-seater career with MP Motorsport before the budget dried out with two F2 rounds to go.

PA (8th): Verschoor was unofficial champion of what I’m calling ‘Rookie Class B’, an underdog quartet of Dutch and German drivers who made deserved steps up from Formula 3 despite their lack of certain funding. Verschoor’s MP seat was the least certain of all, officially confirmed only on a round-by-round basis. But already on debut in Bahrain he qualified fifth – the top rookie – and finished the feature race fourth having led with five laps to go. At Silverstone, without the benefit of testing, he was similarly strong. Consistency was missing but the Macau Grand Prix winner showed his class and didn’t deserve to be bought out of his seat while he was still inside the championship top 10. Even when he returned with Charouz at the final round he came from 16th to score the team’s only feature race point of the season.

7. Juri Vips ESTONIA Hitech GP
6th in standings, 120pts (2 wins, 1 fastest lap, 6 podiums) – TP 53.8%, QA 9.9 (12th), FR 43 (7th), SR 77 (4th), LL 49 (6th)

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

Craig Woollard (5th): The sheer volume of bad luck that Vips had in 2021 means his championship position is not reflective of his performances. This bracket outside of the top one or two down to the end of the top eight is wildly close and arguments can be made to place any one of these drivers anywhere. While Baku was extraordinary in how he traded blows (and won) with team-mate Liam Lawson, the rest of the time just something seemed to be going wrong. Therefore, it’s a bit tricky to judge how good Vips was this year. But the feeling was that he lacked a little bit in outright one-lap pace and in the same flair as some of the rookies (Vips arguably kind of came in as a half-rookie), even if the consistent speed and number of solid results he produced was pretty impressive.

BW (7th): Big things were expected from Vips for 2021 and, though they materialised, it wasn’t quite as much as anyone was expecting. He was a lot like Pourchaire in that when the weekend came together it really came together. But he wasn’t as good at making the most out of the more difficult rounds than he needed to be if he wanted to challenge for the title. Baku was definitely his weekend of the year and where he really seemed to be on top of the format, getting the most out of every race. Unfortunately that wasn’t something that continued, and there doesn’t seem to be another weekend where everything slotted together. That said, next year he should definitely be one to watch for the title, especially as we return to the old format.

AA (10th): As Bethonie said, more was expected from Vips as he was the next in the queue for a AlphaTauri Formula 1 seat coming into 2021. Hitech GP’s car didn’t have the raw speed it had in 2020, and that held the Estonian back in some races. However, when the car proved to be a rocket ship on the streets of Baku he didn’t miss the chance to claim two convincing wins. That, together with a strong central part of the season, pushed him to sixth in the standings. Perhaps Vips won’t go down in history as one of those who put the biggest show on track, but he has been definitely a solid performer this year.

6. Liam Lawson NEW ZEALAND Hitech GP
9th in standings, 103pts (1 win, 1 pole, 2 fastest laps, 3 podiums) – TP 46.2%, QA 7.6 (7th), FR 38 (9th), SR 61 (7th), LL 56 (5th)

Roger Gascoigne (5th): Though he rather lost his way thereafter, Lawson was arguably the standout driver in the first three rounds. He could have had two podiums to go with his winning debut in Bahrain, and a minor technical infringement cost him a hard-fought victory at Monaco after he had pulled off a sublime pass on Piastri. In Baku he was stunningly quick, gaining 14 places in 10 laps in race two, having been pitched out of race one. Starting from feature race pole, an overzealous defensive block of Pourchaire cost him a harsh 10-second penalty and with it a potential victory. He often found himself dicing with Piastri, passing the champion-to-be twice in Baku. Bad luck played a part: an errant fire extinguisher at Monza and an engine failure in Abu Dhabi both caused retirements. His qualifying was poor outside of Baku, and to what extent did his parallel (and successful) DTM campaign distract him?

AA (6th): Expectations were high for the rookie after kicking off the season with a sprint race win and a feature race podium, and he wouldn’t disappoint. When the championship resumed in Monaco, Lawson proved his talent again with a fabulous manoeuvre on Oscar Piastri at the inside of Rascasse, en route to another win that would be eventually taken away due to a technical infringement. If there is a weekend where Lawson could have achieved more, that is Baku. Despite claiming pole, a race one collision and a penalty due to another incident in race three prevented him from reaching the podium on Hitech’s strongest weekend. Thereon, his season was affected by several mechanical failures, but he was still one of the main characters of on-track battles.

PA (6th): Lawson’s sheer talent really shone through at points – especially early on – even if his final championship position didn’t reflect it as well as his remarkable DTM exploits did. A winning start in Bahrain was followed by his stunning wet-weather Monaco win that should never be forgotten – his throttle-mapping mistake that caused his disqualification gave him a bad getaway anyway. He also claimed pole in Baku. But he then faded, not helped by Hitech losing ground in qualifying, but Lawson was usually quicker than team-mate Vips. Like Vips he suffered misfortune too, such as his fire extinguisher snuffing out a strong race at Monza. He was F2’s most spectacular racer and it got him into trouble sometimes. That he and Piastri raced each other so hard so frequently without issue suggests there wasn’t too much wrong with his own car placement, but a wiser approach could pay off in 2022.

5. Dan Ticktum BRITAIN Carlin
4th in standings, 159.5pts (2 wins, 1 fastest lap, 7 podiums) – TP 58.5%, QA 7.0 (5th), FR 75.5 (5th), R2P 84 (3rd), LL 44 (7th)

PA (5th): At the point when Ticktum’s F1 dreams came crashing down (for probably the final time), he was right among F2’s top performers – as evidenced by his second place behind Guanyu Zhou and ahead of Piastri in the Silverstone feature race – so he arguably had some right to feel aggrieved that there wasn’t more trust in his abilities. He made the podium in each of the first six rounds, and three times in feature races – a tally nobody else except Piastri and Zhou matched. But too many points were lost in a surprising number of on-track scrapes for a driver whose wheel-to-wheel judgement has usually been far better than his critics suggest. And his form nosedived at the end of the season, wasting a final chance to show F1 what it was missing.

CB (5th): I’m not quite sure how to define Ticktum’s season, but it was incredibly solid (if not spectacular). He failed to score only four times, and three of those were retirements, meaning that just the Prema drivers had higher average finishing positions. Only Zhou and Piastri recorded more wins, too. But his qualifying dropping away in the season’s second half ruined any chances of a title charge (his average qualifying position fell from 4th across the first four races to 10th in the final four). This performance drop coincided with his departure from Williams’s driver academy, but this sums up the conundrum that is Dan Ticktum, as his behaviour out of the car continues to cause problems for someone so mercurially quick. Two moments that occurred away from racing aside, it was definitely a more mature approach this season and I look forward to seeing him adjust as he moves over to Formula E.

CW (6th): This year probably didn’t give us the best of Ticktum. There were consistent podiums, sure, but there were also big errors, a lack of huge point-paying weekends and a very substandard final two rounds. Off-track comments (and subsequent press conference outbursts) aside, Ticktum liked to complain about boredom and was just regularly in his own mindset through the year. There was the feeling that he could have featured a bit more regularly with the package that served Tsunoda so well last year, but things just rarely quite came together for him, aside from an inherited Monaco win, a fine Sochi success and a smattering of podiums elsewhere. There’s the feeling this year was a missed opportunity, and he leaves F2 without having quite mustered the results his talent was capable of. At least the radio chatter seemed to have reduced this year.

• Feature: How a team switch tilted Ticktum towards the front of F2

4. Robert Shwartzman RUSSIA (RAF) Prema
2nd in standings, 192pts (2 wins, 3 fastest laps, 8 podiums) – TP 43.2%, QA 6.9 (4th), FR 84 (3rd), SR 108 (1st), LL 42 (8th)

CB (2th): Second in the standings, yet this has to be seen as a disappointing season for Shwartzman. While he improved his qualifying performance from last year, it remained inconsistent and this proved decisive with this season’s much-maligned format adding greater emphasis to qualifying. The Russian couldn’t get near his rookie team-mate Piastri in qualifying, citing him as the “strongest team-mate I’ve had in my career”, and it translated into a chasm of points between the two. Piastri may have ended up a comfortable 60.5 points ahead, but Shwartzman found himself outscored by 20 points in qualifying and by 73.5 points in the feature races – a total that could have been higher if not for the shortened Jeddah race. Whatever his plans for 2022, he leaves F2 having only been beaten by four drivers (Mick Schumacher, Callum Ilott, Tsunoda and Piastri) across two seasons – not a bad list of drivers there.

RG (4th): Despite being title runner-up, it was a disappointing year for the pre-season title favourite as his rookie team-mate comprehensively outdrove him. Qualifying let him down too often, and though his racecraft was often superb, he left himself with too much to do. Both of his wins came in the opening sprint race where a front row start was the reward for a poor qualifying. Indeed, while he scored more points (108) than anyone else in the sprint races, taking only two podiums in feature races was not good enough. Once out front he could be uncatchable – in Baku he simply disappeared to win. But luck didn’t do him any favours. In Monaco, where he did top a qualifying session it was in the slower group. And on race day a fluffed pitstop cost him even a podium.

CW (4th): Shwartzman, as stealthy as he has ever been, snuck his way into second in the standings, and his season wasn’t bad by any stretch, but there was very little that was an outstanding highlight. That’s an approach that looked to perhaps even be the one to follow coming into this season, but the strength of the opposition changed the narrative on its head. Shwartzman’s brace of sprint race wins was great, but it also showcased qualifying as his big weakness. He got it nailed in the end (and in Monaco, straight after Prema focused on it during in-season testing), but the damage was done. To be so metronomically consistent in a series in which it is near-impossible to do sp was impressive, the lack of big results in qualifying and feature races less-so. Therefore, fourth on this list feels justified.

• Feature: The F2 juggernauts adopting each other’s strengths in 2021

3. Guanyu Zhou CHINA Virtuosi Racing
3rd in standings, 183pts (4 wins, 1 pole, 1 fastest lap, 9 podiums) – TP 63.5%, QA 4.6 (2nd), FR 112 (2nd), SR 67 (6th), LL 87 (1st)

CW (3rd): It wasn’t quite the title for Alfa Romeo Racing’s 2022 F1 driver, but very much a job done for Zhou in 2021. Yeah, his title challenge ultimately fell flat, but he was probably the driver in the season’s first half. The problem is that it was so long ago, it’s easy to forget his Bahrain weekend, where he persistently made weird strategies emphatically work, and Silverstone where he triumphed over Piastri. Those were both really, really strong performances. However, and this is a very big however, he was far too inconsistent, and some really silly errors cropped up (spinning out before things really got going at Silverstone and Sochi the two prime examples). Irrespective of past experience, this was by no means a dreadful season, but the flatness of the title challenge, errors and lack of ultimate performance makes it impossible to justify a higher position.

RG (2nd): Zhou’s third F2 season was comfortably his most impressive. Pole and the feature race win in Bahrain gave him a flying start, and after winning the first sprint race next time out in Monaco he began to look like title favourite. With two wins and two second places from feature races, he at times looked a class apart. But his racecraft could let him down when he needed to fight through the field and there were too many errors for a driver of his calibre and experience. Spins at Silverstone and on the formation lap in Sochi were costly. But as the only driver to land an F1 seat, he can look at the year as “job done”. 

AA (7th): His season raised more questions than provided answers. With a F1 future on the horizon, he was tipped to at least fight for the title until the very end, but it wasn’t meant to be. Zhou kicked off the season in style with pole, a sprint race podium and feature race victory, but such strong form wouldn’t last long. A lack of pace in Baku and Jeddah, several unforced errors, and not being able to gain places when he was in the middle of the pack are some of the reasons why he was third in the standings and almost 70 points off the champion. It’s true that he was very good when he was at the front, but having the chance to always drive at the front isn’t common in motorsport.

• Feature: How the F2 grid fizzled out of the F1 silly season [September ’21]

2. Theo Pourchaire FRANCE ART Grand Prix
5th in standings, 140pts (2 wins, 1 pole, 4 fastest laps, 3 podiums) – TP 73.7%, QA 4.9 (3rd), FR 77 (4th), SR 59 (8th), LL 61 (4th)

CW (2nd): What young Pourchaire achieved in Monaco was perhaps the single strongest performance across the junior categories in 2021, absolutely decimating the rest of the opposition during his first appearance on the famed street track. But that alone does not elevate him so highly on this list. Dragging what felt like a subpar ART GP package consistently towards the front was a huge achievement in itself and keeping in title contention towards the end despite a mid-season injury meaning he wasn’t quite at peak form on that basis was brilliant. Just the way he hustles a car around is a joy to watch as well, and of all the rookies on this list he was able to produce the most ‘wow’ moments. The sole downside was a few unnecessary mistakes creeping in. It’s like watching early Fernando Alonso in F1, Pourchaire’s going to be that outstanding.

CB (3rd): A lowest finish of 10th all season – discounting the races where he didn’t make the chequered flag – shows just how solid a year this was for Pourchaire. However, I think his consistency worked against him as too often he found himself in the middle of the points, with only three podiums all season. His rookie campaign would probably get more credit if not for Piastri, and it had spectacular moments – namely that pole lap in Monaco. Beating his nearest challenger by almost half a second was astounding and it highlights just how exciting a talent he really is. It’s also important to factor in his accident in Baku and ensuing injury that affected him across the Silverstone weekend, which led to him scoring just 10 points in four races. Another step-up next season and he has to be one of the clear title favourites.

BW (4th): Pourchaire came into the season as one of the rookies to watch, and he definitely lived up to that. It wasn’t a perfect season by any means, with a few too many retirements not necessarily his fault. But overall it was better than could be expected from a building year in F2. Seeing him bounce back from injury was brilliant, and to be able to keep that steady improvement is a good sign of things to come. But there are still improvements to be made. Along with typical rookie mistakes, Pourchaire can make leaps in qualifying and race pace. When the weekend came together, it really came together, but he didn’t seem to be able to bounce back from poor qualifying results as well as others.

• Feature: What Pourchaire’s future could be, and remembering the man who founded it

1. Oscar Piastri AUSTRALIA Prema
1st in standings, 252.5pts (6 wins, 5 poles, 6 fastest laps, 11 podiums) – TP 56.8%, QA 2.3 (1st), FR 139.5 (1st), SR 93 (2nd), LL 68 (2nd)

BW (1st): It’s hard to see anyone but Piastri in the top spot. Coming into the year, even as a FIA F3 champion, its fair to say most people saw this as a learning year for him. Apparently he didn’t get the memo. There’s a lot of talk about the format changes but, in my opinion, being able to adapt to a different format and manage a title challenge over the course of a season is much more important than bring able to qualify well and dominate races. In series like FE, we’ve seen that’s what separates the great from the champion and bodes well for whatever Piastri does in the future. Obviously his qualifying and race pace were also phenomenal, showing a clear step up from F3 last season.

PA (1st): Piastri began the season showing the same calm but effective racecraft that worked so well for him in F3 (he quickly learnt from fighting Ticktum too hard in Bahrain) and it looked like that alone would make him a very strong title contender given how well-suited it was to 2021’s format. Then he started to nail qualifying – his weakness from F3 – and he became utterly unstoppable. His growth and self-improvement to this point has been somewhat reminiscent of George Russell’s, and with that he made the most of a Prema package that is once more consistently strong across the board for the first time since Charles Leclerc’s domination of 2017. As a rookie champion he’s rightly talked about in the same terms, and F1 teams should be fighting over his services – even if only on loan.

RG (1st): What new can be said about Piastri’s incredible season? Yes, he was in the strongest team, but he clearly had the measure of his more experienced team-mate. His F3 title had been won through consistency rather than outright speed but five consecutive poles this year comprehensively erased any remaining doubts there. In the second half of this year, he was simply untouchable. To win four feature races on the bounce is a very tough ask in such a competitive series. Inevitably, where reversed grids force even the fastest driver into the midfield skirmishes there were some isolated incidents but by-and-large he managed to keep out of trouble. Only Shwartzman took more points in the sprint races. Undoubtedly a worthy champion. Had his winning streak come earlier in the year, his claim for an F1 race seat for 2022 would surely have been irresistible.

CW (1st): There were no persistent flaws to Piastri’s outstanding campaign, and he is the easy choice for top spot on that basis. He just kept getting better and better as the year went on and was the strongest driver for much of the year above experienced opposition. Was he the most ruthless overtaker? No, but that’s not what wins you an F2 title. Piastri was measured, methodical and mighty in his approach, often being passive in the first race of a weekend to capitalise later on, particularly once he had qualifying nailed. The way he simply tore up the script and dominated what should have been an open season was a real shock. I would certainly argue that this has been the strongest season for a F2 driver since Leclerc. Piastri was that good this year.

• Feature: How Piastri ascended to another level with his crushing F2 title run

More F2 features
Opinion: Why F2’s stewards were right to let Deledda race in Monaco
The youngest ever winners in F1’s primary feeder series

The post The Top 10 Formula 2 drivers of 2021 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Oscar Piastri is on the verge of securing his third successive junior single-seater title as he can mathematically clinch the Formula 2 crown in Jeddah this Sunday afternoon.

The Alpine junior holds a 47-point lead over Prema team-mate and Ferrari junior Robert Shwartzman with four races to go – two feature races and two sprint races.

He increased his advantage by taking his fourth win of the season in the second sprint race in Saudi Arabia, while Shwartzman has overtaken Virtuosi Racing’s future Alfa Romeo Formula 1 driver Guanyu Zhou for second in the standings.

Dan Ticktum (Carlin), Sauber starlet Theo Pourchaire (ART Grand Prix) and Red Bull junior Juri Vips (Hitech GP) are all also in mathematical contention, but their chances of the title are very remote.

Like F1, the addition of bonus points for fastest lap adds another element, but the following scenarios would guarantee the title in Piastri’s way with one round to spare.

When asked by Formula Scout in the post-race two press conference whether he had eyes more on Piastri ahead or Zhou behind in the title race, Shwartzman replied:

“I’m pointing more towards Oscar, even though I know that he is quite far in front. But still, I look forward, not backwards. My target is to catch Oscar and in the dream scenario it is possible, but realistically Oscar is very consistent so if he doesn’t do any mistakes, it’s going to be pretty, pretty hard to catch him up.

“But I’m pointing towards him because I just want to get that gap as close as possible and in the end, it will be what it will be.”

Piastri, meanwhile, is willing to take more risk on Sunday, as he showcased in the second sprint race compared to the first.

“I knew I had more pace than Jehan [Daruvala, who led race two], I also wanted to get the fastest lap because it’s an extra couple of points,” he said when Formula Scout asked about his approach.

“But also try to learn a little bit more for tomorrow, what the car was like in clean air and just improve my driving a little bit because there are still a few areas where I can improve.

“For tomorrow, I’ll try to bring out the same Oscar as race two, I think race one Oscar can stay on the shelf because he wasn’t that good.

“Of course I need to manage the risk tomorrow, but I still want to of course try to win.

“I won’t try to do anything silly, but I think I showed today that I’m more than capable of taking some risks and managing it fine.”

The post How Oscar Piastri can seal the Formula 2 title in the Jeddah feature race appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photos: Formula Motorsport Limited

It has taken until December, but the 2021 F2 season enters its penultimate weekend with a true narrative having finally started to take shape. Craig Woollard considers who’s still in with a shot at the title.

In a way, it is a little bit of a surprise that it hasn’t taken all the way until we were several days into our advent calendars before figuring out just who exactly was in the mix for Formula 2 title success this year, such was the way this season was laid out.

It’s been nearly 10 weeks since Sochi – where we unexpectedly had a trial run of the 2022 weekend format with one sprint race followed by one feature race – and anybody could be forgiven for not quite understanding the state of play in this highly stop-start season.

Pre-season, Guanyu Zhou predicted a 10-way scrap for the title, which honestly felt pretty accurate at the time. Realistically, we instead find ourselves down to a final five with two rounds to go on entirely new layouts – the fearsomely fast street circuit at Jeddah and the revised Yas Marina season finale set to decide the championship.

Sure, 130 points are on the table, meaning everyone down to Richard Verschoor in 10th (who’s actually lost his seat for Jeddah) is mathematically in the frame with six races to go. So Zhou is correct in a way, but even securing a double podium in what will be a one-season wonder for a much-maligned format has proven to be a challenge, nevermind a perfect weekend.

We also have two new layouts that will throw in a massive curveball. Nobody has ever been to Jeddah’s Corniche circuit before, which features three DRS zones and some mind-bogglingly fast sections of racetrack. In addition, Abu Dhabi’s finale (and likely title decider), will take place on a heavily-revised layout. Out have gone two of the twiddly, slow chicanes, and in are banked sweepers, more open sections and a faster corner before the first very long straight.

Forty points is considered to be a very good weekend for a driver. But even if Juri Vips in sixth can manage two very good weekends, he’s already confessed that he’s out of this race due to sustained reliability issues. Sitting 76 points behind Piastri, frankly, the Red Bull junior is realistically out of it now.

That leaves us with the top five: Championship leader Oscar Piastri, who owned a weekend for the third event running at Sochi; future Alfa Romeo Formula 1 driver Zhou, who had a miserable Sochi; Robert Shwartzman, who is metronomically picking up points but must get on top of his qualifying struggles; Dan Ticktum, who has had a podium at every round in what could be the strongest race package; and Theo Pourchaire, the teenage sensation bouncing back from injury in fine fashion.

Pourchaire’s 58 points behind Piastri, but he reiterated twice over the Sochi weekend – once while sheltering from the rain on Saturday, and once after tasting champagne on the podium – that he is still in this fight.

“Yeah, for sure I’m competitor,” he said before the sole sprint race of the weekend. “It’s not finished, it’s not finished. It’s far from the end. We still have two races in Sochi and then two complete rounds to go, but for sure Oscar is in a better place than me.

“I’m quite far from him, but there is I think 65 points per race weekend to take, so it can change really fast. I just keep focused on myself, I try to do a good job, to be more consistent. I’m really close to P3, that’s my first goal. I think the top three is not so far and a realistic goal. And then I don’t know, a lot of things can happen and if I can win the championship, I will do it, it’s not finished until Abu Dhabi.”

When asked about his strong form over recent rounds after his second place to Piastri in the feature race, he felt that he has been strong all year.

“I’ve been in shape since the beginning of the year. I just had mechanical failures in Bahrain, the broken wrist in Baku. Silverstone was really bad because of that and the start. Then I just found a bit of consistency, a bit of calm in my year. Just to have no more problems with the car. I drive a bit better. Yeah, I feel more confident in the car and the injury I had at Baku was not easy to manage.

“So, for sure, now it looks like I’m doing a better job but I’m doing the same job as at the beginning of the year. It’s still very, very long for me. It’s still two complete weekends. Two times 65 points to take, so it’s far from the end. For sure Oscar is in a good position, but it’s far from the end. I keep pushing.”

Honest as ever, Ticktum meanwhile isn’t quite as optimistic as the driver he currently sits ahead of in the points.

“Realistic? No, not really,” he admitted despite winning the sprint in Sochi. “I’d have to have a flawless rest of the season basically if I was going to have the title. Luck would have to constantly be in my favour, and I’d have to have another couple of wins. Oscar would have to struggle a bit, which of course is a possibility, but I’m not thinking about it too much anymore really. I’m a bit of a way behind, there’s still a chance but realistically it’s a small one.”

Even if he is playing down his chances, Ticktum absolutely is a factor in this title battle with the package he has and with the form he is in.

Moments later, Shwartzman said that “I’ll be a bit more optimistic and maybe naive: I still believe we have a pretty decent chance to win.

“I don’t know how many points now I’m behind, and obviously Oscar is going to be starting from pole tomorrow, but anything can happen. I’m still looking focused and looking forward to do a good start and good race tomorrow and get some good points. Then do a really good last two rounds, and I think it’s doable. I think if actually everything goes well, we can bring that challenge to the final race in Abu Dhabi, and we can see if we can manage it.”

For Zhou, it was a very difficult weekend. Spinning on cold tyres on the formation lap for the sprint race and stalling was a huge mistake to make on a rare day that Piastri failed to score. He didn’t have much of a role to play in the feature race either – he sat hovering around the net fifth-seventh range throughout and ended up in the middle of that in sixth.

The damage was that Piastri extended his points lead to 36, which can really be considered a comfortable margin now, but by no means has he got it secured yet. Regardless, he will enter the Jeddah feature race as the championship leader.

The Alpine junior is the one now with the target on his back. He wouldn’t admit it when asked by Formula Scout after taking his second feature race win in succession, but he must at least acknowledge within himself that he is the one being chased now, especially as he is so emphatically getting the job done.

“I’m not going to call myself the favourite, but my lead is the biggest it’s been,” he said, when asked directly whether he is the favourite. “I feel like I’m driving well, and the team’s been doing a great job with the car as well. We’ve been strong since round one, and I think we’ve been on the podium at every feature race except for Bahrain. That’s testament to the whole package, but I’m certainly glad I’m in the position I’m in and not having to try and chase up.”

Piastri is the sort of character to admit when he feels he does well but also has a tendency to calm expectations. It’s doubly impressive when there is a lot of hype surrounding him – especially on social media – naturally as the F2 championship leader. It’s a different approach to that of Callum Ilott, who did not hold back last year in admitting he was the favourite mid-season.

These are the in-form drivers, those finishing regularly in the top five across the races and those picking up big points across a weekend. Crucially, they’ve also largely had the most fortune of all the frontrunners, and have been able to sustain a consistent run of relatively strong weekends in most cases. If not, such as in Zhou’s case in Sochi, he had plenty of points as it was, so stayed in contention with that weekend’s inadequate score.

It’s been an agonising wait before the penultimate instalment of this very stop-start F2 season. All of the drivers will have had a chance to regroup ahead of the crucial doubleheader to close the season. For Zhou, Piastri and Ticktum, they all can relax to a degree knowing their futures are secured in some way in world championship-level competition next year.

They’ve also had a chance to relax a bit. After such an eventful weekend at Sochi, not least with FIA Formula 3’s title decider on the bill too, it felt like the whole F1 support paddock could have done with a breather. We’ve had that now, but the intensity of the final two weekends will showcase the best out of the F2 elite.

The post Which drivers are really in contention to become Formula 2 champion? appeared first on Formula Scout.

The two-time Macau Grand Prix winner has secured his racing future with the NIO 333 Formula E team

The future wasn’t looking particularly encouraging for Dan Ticktum this summer. An embarrassing incident caught on camera led to an early departure from the Williams Formula 1 team and even put his Formula 2 seat at risk.

Thankfully for the 22-year-old the budget has remained in place to see out the F2 season with Carlin, a team he has also been driver coaching for through 2021. But with his F1 dreams extinguished, being unable to make the grid on sponsorship value alone and with his previous exit from the Red Bull Junior Team always looming over him, it made 2022 look very uncertain.

After some prolonged negotiations, it was then finally confirmed this Wednesday (November 25) that Ticktum would join the NIO 333 team for the 2021-22 Formula E season and would be team-mate to McLaren simulator driver Oliver Turvey.

The Formula Scout newsdesk, like many others, had some immediate opinions on the driver who completes FE’s 2022 grid:

Ida Wood (@wood_ida_)

There are some drivers who you’re never going to fully understand how they tick until you’re with them at a race track, and you see them interact with their team. That’s when the likes of Ticktum stand out.

His technical feedback is incredible, and he communicates it very clearly which is why he’s of value as a driver coach now too, a great liaison to have between engineer and driver. Despite all that understanding, the reluctance to change himself in the car was actually his greatest flaw as it prevented him from fulfilling his potential in Super Formula and initially in F2. Had he not let ego get in the way at that level, it would have helped weather other, more public, storms.

That flaw changed in 2021, with a bit of adaptation behind the wheel leading to his qualifying form drastically improving.

Ticktum’s street circuit form

The post Opinion: What Dan Ticktum will bring to Formula E appeared first on Formula Scout.

Ticktum, formerly a junior of the Red Bull and Williams Formula 1 teams and briefly a Team Mugen driver in Super Formula while still part of Red Bull, has previously not shown interest in FE but will be a paid driver at NIO alongside Oliver Turvey.

This year Ticktum has been racing in F2 and is currently fourth in the standings with two rounds to go. The penultimate round in Jeddah begins a day after FE’s pre-season test at Valencia Ricardo Tormo concludes, so Ticktum will miss a day of testing.

• Feature: How a team switch has tilted Ticktum towards F2 title contention

“I am very happy to be racing with the NIO 333 Formula E team,” said Ticktum.

“It’s going to be quite a big challenge as I have not had long to prepare for the test next week, and FE is complicated, but it’ll be very exciting.

“There are quite a few different tools you can use as a driver but it’s a totally different experience to F2, so I’m really looking forward to it, both mentally and physically.

“I’ve had a great few days with the team at Silverstone this week and hopefully we can try to make some progress next season and get further up the grid.”

The NIO 333 team has recently undergone senior management changes as it plans to bring itself back to the front of the field after several seasons of struggle.

“Let’s warmly welcome Daniel Ticktum as our newest member of the NIO 333 Formula E family,” said Vincent Wang, NIO’s chief executive officer.

“His race results that impress me the most are the two victories in the Macau Grand Prix, one of the most famous races in the world.

“Though he has shouldered some difficulties during his career, I believe that his experience will pave the way to success. He is a young, bright new star who will shine on the FE racetrack[s].”

NIO will call on its reserve driver Adam Carroll for the day of testing Ticktum will be absent from. Formula Scout understrands the Dragon Racing team had also shown interest in signing Ticktum for 2022.

The post NIO 333 signs Dan Ticktum for 2022 Formula E season appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Dan Ticktum has admitted that winning the Formula 2 sprint race at Sochi feels bittersweet amid uncertainty over his motorsport future.

Ticktum won the sole sprint race of the weekend on Saturday evening after heavy rain caused the championship to abandon the second scheduled race of the event.

He beat Hitech GP’s Juri Vips in a race held on a drying track but revealed in the press conference afterwards that the win doesn’t give him the satisfaction that it perhaps otherwise would have if there was a Formula 1 seat on the line.

“It’s sweet, there’s no doubt about that. Obviously every racing driver is in any category wants to win,” he said.

“However, I sort of point back to what I said from Monza: Whilst it’s lovely to win on the day, it sort of doesn’t mean that much really because I don’t know where I’m going to be next year. And I’m certainly not going to be in Formula 1 which was always my goal.

“So, I wear my heart on my sleeve and I’m pretty down about it, not going to lie. So, I’ve worked very hard, I’ve caused a lot of mistakes for myself, and people know what they are but yeah, I’m happy to win but it’s a bit bitterly sweet. Mixed emotions, let’s say.”

Ticktum departed the Williams F1 team in the summer, and asked how timely his latest win was, he said: “Look, winning isn’t going to hurt. I just don’t really know what to say, to be honest. I’m just sort of… the last few weeks, accepting the fact that I’m not going to achieve my goal. I don’t want to get all depressing, but it is depressing.

“The [lack of] super licence denied me a few years ago, I’ve done some stupid things along the way and I don’t know where I’m going to end up. I’ve always sort of said that if I don’t make it to Formula 1, I’ll bugger off and do something else, if I’m honest.

“But without being arrogant, I think I’ve probably got too much to offer behind the steering wheel to do that. But I don’t know. I have a couple of options, but I don’t know what to say. It’s not the best time, let’s just say that.”

When asked to elaborate on those options, he bluntly said: “I can’t say exactly but anyone with half a brain will know it’s IndyCar, DTM, or another year of F2 pretty much. Maybe Formula E. Those are going to be the options, so those are the places where I’m going to be looking.”

The post Ticktum says latest F2 win ‘doesn’t mean that much’ after F1 snub appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Carlin’s Dan Ticktum won Formula 2’s rescheduled opening sprint race at Sochi in difficult conditions as both Guanyu Zhou and Oscar Piastri failed to score.

There was drama before the 18-lap race had even got away as both Virtuosi Racing entries of Zhou and Felipe Drugovich got into trouble on their way to the grid.

Zhou spun at Turn 2 and stalled the car, ending his afternoon early, while Drugovich suffered the same fate further around the lap as he crashed out on the damp track.

This delayed the start by five minutes. The race began with all cars on medium tyres behind the safety car before Ticktum got a good start.

Hitech GP’s Juri Vips and Liam Lawson hounded Ticktum early on, but they too came to grief. Vips had a small error in the final sector of the lap that took him wide, while Lawson crashed out on lap six.

That triggered a second virtual safety car of the afternoon after Trident’s Bent Viscaal spun at Turn 16 on lap five and stalled.

When the racing resumed, it was without the drag reduction system, and Ticktum was able to maintain a gap to Vips out front throughout to take his second victory of the season.

Vips took his first podium since the first sprint race at Silverstone, while Prema Racing’s Robert Shwartzman took a podium at home after an early scrap with HWA Racelab’s Jake Hughes.

Hughes, making his sixth start in F2, took not only his best result but also the best result for the team under the HWA guise.

ART Grand Prix’s Theo Pourchaire, despite being passed by Carlin’s Jehan Daruvala on the second restart after being held up by a slow-to-react Ralph Boschung, recovered to finish fifth ahead of the Campos driver.

ART team-mate Christian Lundgaard took seventh, with MP Motorsport’s Richard Verschoor rounding out the points finishers.

Championship leader Oscar Piastri, meanwhile, slipped back to ninth after an early mistake and was unable to recover back into the points.

MP’s Lirim Zendeli rounded out the top 10 – which would have given him pole for sprint race two had it not been cancelled.

DAMS’ Marcus Armstrong was 11th ahead of Daruvala, who spun late on.

Race results (18 laps)

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