This weekend Formula 2 takes to Italy’s legendary Monza for round eighth of the 2020 championship.
Robert Shwartzman heads to the Temple of Speed back in control of the title fight, courtesy of his sprint race win at Spa last week. After a nightmare triple header at Silverstone and Barcelona which yielded only two points finishes, his third win of the season will have been a great relief as the championship heads into its home stretch.
Shwartzman will also be very happy to carry that momentum into Monza, as he took a commanding win here last year in the F3 feature race to eliminate all but one of his rivals from the title hunt. Returning with the same Prema team that took him to the top step last year, Shwartzman has plenty of reasons for confidence this weekend.
And it’s not just because of Shwartzman that Prema are one of the favourites this weekend. Off the back of a superb double podium at Spa, Mick Schumacher has the enviable honour of the most podium finishes of anyone so far this season.
The German may still be chasing his first win of the season, but he looks to be on a roll at least with consistent points and top three finishes. In fact, Schumacher has outscored everybody but Yuki Tsunoda over the last six races, and could now be considered an outside bet for the championship if he can build on these results over the final five rounds.
It’s worth noting that Schumacher’s season is starting to resemble his run to the 2018 European F3 title. After a patchy start to the campaign with only two podiums in the opening 12 races, he switched things on at the halfway point and went on to dominate the rest of the year.
While it won’t be easy to do the same in F2, keep an eye on him nonetheless as a potential dark horse in this second half of the season.
Callum Ilott will be hoping to disrupt Prema’s momentum at Monza. Since winning the second Silverstone feature race from pole, Ilott’s results have dipped to a best finish of fifth in Spain, while a costly retirement at Spa last weekend handed the title lead back to Shwartzman.
Ilott has a good history with Monza. He’s been on the podium and won there in European F3 and GP3, and last year it was where he took his first F2 pole while driving for the Charouz-run Sauber Junior Team.
Another pole this weekend would be a great first step towards taking back the title lead from Shwartzman. And as the driver with the most pole positions so far this season, Ilott’s got more than enough form to do so.