Hitech’s Nikita Mazepin took his maiden Formula 2 win in the Silverstone feature race, prevailing over a rotation of challengers behind.
The race started with a slow launch for polesitter Felipe Drugovich, allowing Mick Schumacher to take the lead into Turn 1 while Mazepin jumped Christian Lundgaard for third. Drugovich, starting on the hard tyres compared to the medium runners around him, continued to struggle for pace through lap 1 and dropped to fourth behind Mazepin and Lundgaard.
Mazepin quickly got his own tyres up to temperature, closing up to Schumacher on lap 3 and then passing the Prema for the lead shortly after. By lap 5, Mazepin had already broken the DRS range to Schumacher, while Schumacher himself seemed to drop back towards Lundgaard.
Mick Schumacher, Prema (Clive Mason / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Mazepin and Schumacher made their stops for hard tyres on lap 8, followed by Lundgaard a lap later. Although Schumacher gained time on Mazepin in the pitlane, he struggled more than the Russian when making his way through traffic.
On lap 12 Schumacher lost half a second passing Guilherme Samaia, then got stuck behind Artem Markelov. On lap 15 Lundgaard overtook Schumacher for net second, while Louis Deletraz closed to four tenths behind him.
Deletraz eventually passed Schumacher on lap 24, which prompted a fall through the order as the German lost out to Guanyu Zhou, Yuki Tsunoda and Callum Ilott over the next two laps.
Deletraz didn’t stay in third for long, being passed himself by Zhou and Tsunoda on lap 25. Zhou and Tsunoda were running the alternate strategy with hard tyres, and lapping much faster than those on mediums. On lap 27 Zhou quickly caught and passed Lundgaard for second, while Tsunoda demoted the ART off the podium on the final lap.
But despite their pace advantage, Zhou and Tsunoda ran out of laps to catch Mazepin and had to settle for second and third respectively behind the Hitech.
Lundgaard finished fourth, while Ilott recovered from stalling on the formation lap and starting from the pitlane to take fifth ahead of Deletraz. Polesitter Drugovich suffered a slow pit stop and eventually finished down in seventh ahead of Dan Ticktum. Schumacher finished ninth, and Nobuharu Matsushita took the final point in tenth after passing Jehan Daruvala through the final corner of the last lap.
Felipe Drugovich, MP Motorsport (Rudy Carezzevoli / Getty Images)
Liam Lawson took his second win of the Formula 3 season at the Silverstone feature race, seeing off the Premas of Oscar Piastri and Logan Sargeant in a race fraught with incidents.
Lawson started from second behind polesitter Sargeant. Although Sargeant held first off the line, Lawson was close enough to harry him throughout the opening lap and make a lunge around the outside of Stowe to steal the lead.
After a brief interruption on lap 4, when Matteo Nannini slowed on track and brought out a Virtual Safety Car, Lawson began pulling away from Sargeant. The American driver then dropped back into the clutches of teammate Piastri, who demoted Sargeant to third on lap 7.
Piastri was better able to keep pace with Lawson than Sargeant, closing to within half a second by lap 9. On lap 11 Piastri drew alongside Lawson under DRS and looked set to take first place, but the Australian ran wide over the kerbs and couldn’t complete the move.
Oscar Piastri, Prema (Bryn Lennon / Getty Images)
With Piastri right on his tail, Lawson was handed a saving grace shortly after when the safety car was deployed for Bent Viscaal, who spun after contact with Ben Barnicoat through Luffield and collected Jack Doohan’s HWA.
The safety car remained out for four laps, but was then redeployed almost immediately when Olli Caldwell spun in the middle of the pack and was hit heavily by Lukas Dunner and Max Fewtrell.
With Caldwell’s rear wing and suspension across the track, the race went on to end under the safety car, preserving Lawson’s first place over Piastri and Sargeant.
Jake Hughes finished fourth ahead of the third Prema of Frederik Vesti, with Alex Peroni climbing up from 18th on the grid to take sixth. Sebastian Fernandez finished seventh, Clement Novalak took eighth and the fastest lap, David Beckmann was ninth, and Aleksandr Smolyar took the reverse grid pole for the tomorrow in tenth.
Logan Sargeant, Prema (Rudy Carezzevoli / Getty Images)
Formula 3 returns this weekend at historic Silverstone, for the fourth round of the 2020 season.
As things stand coming into Great Britain, championship leader Oscar Piastri has begun to break into a dominant position in the title fight. On 76 points so far, he is more than a feature race victory ahead of his nearest rival, teammate Logan Sargeant.
Apart from one eighth place in the first Austria sprint race, Piastri has consistently finished in the top five in every race so far this season, including a double podium last time out in Hungary. Meanwhile, Sargeant has yet to take victory this year, while third-placed driver Theo Pourchaire didn’t score points at all in the first round of the season.
David Beckmann, Trident (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Piastri’s rivals might take some heart from the fact that Silverstone was one of the few rounds Prema didn’t dominate last year, with Juri Vips and Leonardo Pulcini taking both victories for Hitech Grand Prix.
Hitech don’t look to be the same contenders they were last year, despite Liam Lawson winning the first sprint race of the year in Austria and Dennis Hauger finishing third in Hungary. However, Trident and ART have both been close challengers to Prema in 2020 and will be pushing to deal any blow they can to the Italian team this weekend.
One driver in particular who could be a real headache for Prema and Piastri is David Beckmann, who comes to Silverstone off the back of his first F3 win in the Hungary sprint race. With two further podiums already to his name, Beckmann is also one of only three drivers—alongside Piastri and Richard Verschoor—to score in every race so far this season.
Aleksandr Smolyar, ART (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
As for ART, Pourchaire underlined his own championship credentials in Hungary by becoming the only repeat race winner of the season so far. The young Frenchman has a bit of ground to make up after his slow start to the campaign, but clearly has the speed to challenge for the podium this weekend.
But it’s not just Pourchaire carrying ART’s hopes. The French team has plenty more talent in its lineup in Sebastian Fernandez and Aleksandr Smolyar, both of whom have taken a feature race pole this year.
So far luck hasn’t been on their side, with Fernandez and Smolyar both retiring early from their respective pole position starts. But if either of them can marry up another strong qualifying performance with a clean race on Saturday, there’s no reason they can’t join the fight at the front with their teammate.
Formula 2 returns this weekend at Silverstone for the fourth round of the 2020 campaign.
Prema driver and Ferrari protege Robert Shwartzman will come into the weekend full of confidence, after becoming the championship’s only repeat winner so far last time out in Hungary.
With 18 points in hand over the next-best driver Callum Ilott, Shwartzman’s goal at Silverstone will be to build that gap even further and break free of the chasing pack. If he can keep up the momentum now, there will be little his rivals can do to stop Shwartzman asserting his dominance over the title as he did in Formula 3 last year.
Ilott will of course be the first of many drivers hoping to disrupt Shwartzman’s title challenge this weekend. Since winning the first race of the season, Ilott’s own campaign has been patchy by comparison, with only one further podium to his name so far.
A win on home soil this weekend will easily put Ilott back in the mix, and he should be well-placed to do so as his UNI-Virtuosi team won last year’s Silverstone feature race with Luca Ghiotto.
Callum Ilott, UNI-Virtuosi (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Behind Shwartzman and Ilott, there’s a fierce battle developing over third place in the standings. Christian Lundgaard currently holds the position with 43 points, but Mick Schumacher, Dan Ticktum and Marcus Armstrong are all within nine points of the Dane.
Although Lundgaard is quite a way adrift of Shwartzman, he is still likely to be a threat this weekend. Prior to Hungary, where he failed to score in either race, Lundgaard had been on a run of top-six finishes culminating in his sprint race win in Austria.
If Lundgaard can put his Hungaroring disappointment behind him, he’s shown he has the pace to be a serious title threat this year.
Schumacher comes to Silverstone on a good run of form, having taken a double podium at the last round in Hungary. However, he’ll need to make a much bigger step forward this weekend if he wants to stay in contention for the title and an F1 shot next year, as he is so far yet to outscore Shwartzman in any race this season.
Meanwhile, Ticktum has also displayed plenty of ability in his F2 debut, although has yet to claim his first win in the series. A challenger in sprint races in particular, the DAMS driver will be one to watch this weekend for sure.
Dan Ticktum, DAMS (Carl Bingham, LAT Images / FIA F2 Championship)
To some, the incredible form of Scott Dixon is nothing of a surprise. After winning at Texas, Indianapolis, and Road America he sealed his 49th career win, three behind IndyCar and Formula 1 legend Mario Andretti who stands at second on the all-time list. This will be his 18th consecutive season in American open-wheel racing with a win on his quest to achieve his sixth championship title.
Dixon proved his class on the restart of the season, finishing 4.411 seconds clear of rival Simon Pagenaud at Texas Motor Speedway where he led 157 of the 200 laps. What immediately followed was another dominant win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, winning by over 20 seconds over Graham Rahal. Finally, a win at Road America gave him his third consecutive win, with seemingly no let-up in sight.
Chris Jones / IndyCar Media
Since then, we have had three more races: one other at Road America, and two at Iowa Speedway. Despite starting 17th in both races, Dixon rose to an incredible second and fifth place to solidify his lead at the top of the standings
How has Dixon done this? A mixture of raw pace, consistency, experience, and well-executed strategy calls. Interestingly, despite not starting anywhere higher than the third row of the grid five of the last six races he has finished on the podium four times, a testament to how good his race strategy and decision-making skills are.
However, all three Penske drivers are firmly in the hunt. Simon Pagenaud, Will Power and Josef Newgarden will be looking to stop Scott Dixon’s momentum heading into the second half of the season.
Dixon says that he is in impeccable form, in an interview he states:
“For me right now, I’m physically stronger,” he said. “Mentally, I’m in a better place than ever.”
Bad news for his competitors, but great news for race fans.
Safety is Key
A significant moment in IndyCar history was the implementation of the Aeroscreen, designed by RedBull Advanced Technologies. The engineering consultancy of the championship-winning Formula 1 team proposed the concept in 2016 only to be rejected for the Halo device.
The device improves the design of the Halo in a significant way. The polycarbonate ballistic windscreen protects the driver from any debris that would otherwise bypass the titanium frame. Additionally, the windscreen can withstand a hit from a 2lb (0.9kg) object at a speed of 220 mph (354kmh). Thus, pieces of a car, that for any reason, rise to meet the cockpit of a competitor are very unlikely to reach the driver inside, and we now have evidence to back this up.
During lap 144 at the Iowa Speedway, a botched pitstop left Will Power’s car with a loose left front wheel. Subsequently on lap 157 Power understeered into the wall, breaking the front suspension, and sending one of his tyres over the car itself. Luckily, the tyre deflected off the windscreen and away from the driver. Power heaped praise on the effectiveness of the Aeroscreen following the race:
“Man, I can’t thank IndyCar enough for everything they’ve done safety-wise with the Aeroscreen and halo inside the Aeroscreen,” he said. “You just saw Colton Herta go over the top of someone, and they’ve just done a tremendous job. It’s better than any other series that have invented something like it. Just a very good job,”
The crash he was referring to involved Colton Herta on lap 157. Due to a confusion during an aborted restart he accelerated into the back of Rinus Veekay. Horrifically, Herta can be seen being thrown into the air above Veekay. Luckily, the Aeroscreen kept the Dutchman safe as Herta’s car lands on top of him.
Without the Aeroscreen it is highly likely that both these incidents could have resulted in serious injuries for all the drivers involved.
The Aeroscreen, while still criticised for things such as overheating the drivers in the cockpits, is a positive contribution to safety in motorsport and certainly here to stay.
McLaren’s Rise to Prominence
Chris Jones / IndyCar Media
Two years ago, McLaren were struggling in Formula One with a series of reliability issues with their Honda powertrain and a car that did not meet the team’s expectations. A disastrous campaign resulted in them losing two-time champion Fernando Alonso. However, it forced them to embark on a fundamental restructuring process that would lead them back to the front of motorsport.
Since then, it has been a remarkable turnaround for the team, with two podiums and two fastest laps to its name in Formula One this year. McLaren also have been racing in IndyCar alongside Schmidt Arrow Peterson, rebranded as Arrow McLaren SP. This seems to have been a partnership made in heaven with a serious of impressive drives from both Patricio O’Ward and Indy Lights champion Oliver Askew.
An impressive race at Road America saw Patricio O’Ward score his first pole position, but unfortunately lose the win to Chip Ganassi star Felix Rosenqvist on the final lap of the race. Not too long after at Iowa Speedway both Arrow McLaren Chevrolets were among the fastest cars in the field even if the results for both cars did not reflect their outright pace.
Rookie Oliver Askew impressed with his first podium in Race 1 and an impressive sixth after a late stint on fresher tyres. Meanwhile, it was a case of what might have been for O’Ward.
After making some impressive overtakes using the high line he gained five positions, eventually hunting down race leader Josef Newgarden for the win. Unfortunately, a slow pitstop cost O’Ward the lead lap and ultimately the race win. He finished in 12th, arguably an undeserved result for such an impressive drive.
Oliver Askew now sits at the top of the Rookie of the Year standings (115 points) while his teammate is firmly in the championship hunt, sitting in fourth (162 points). Though, after narrowly losing two race wins, O’Ward may feel that he should be sitting in second place only below Scott Dixon in the standings had results gone his way. Pato remains cautiously optimistic about the team’s chances this year:
“We want to win races, be a contender in the championship,” he says. “Everyone is pushing the same way as I am, with the same amount of energy and motivation. We have a great group of engineers and the car has felt good everywhere we’ve been.
Its no secret that Formula E divides the motorsport community, but here’s why you should watch the Berlin finale that kicks off in just under a fortnight’s time.
The championship:
Image courtesy of Formula E
Formula E is undoubtedly one of the most competitive open-wheeled series you will find. With five different winners in the opening five races, the championship is wide open. Antonio Felix Da Costa has a slender lead going into the final six races; only eleven points clear of Mitch Evans in second. Third is Alexander Sims just a further ten points behind. In fact, eight teams are represented by drivers in the top ten. Both championships are wide open: lots of wheel to wheel action is certain.
New Faces:
The return of Formula E on the fifth August also sees the return of many drivers. However, three drivers that will not be returning to the grid are Dragon’s Brendon Hartley, Nio’s Ma Qinghua, and Mahindra’s Pascal Wehrlein. This opens up spaces for two new drivers to enter the frame: Rene Rast, and Sergio Sette Camara. Following Audi’s dismissal of Daniel Abt earlier in lockdown, the German team announced that Rene Rast would take his seat, with Abt later being confirmed for Nio. At the time, the dropping of Abt caused much controversy and many thought it a shame that he did not have a seat on the grid. However, Nio picked the German up and he is ready and raring to get racing again. Pascal Wehrlein and Brendon Hartley also announced that they had parted ways with their teams; leaving a seat for Alex Lynn’s to make his return at Mahindra and Sette Camara to join Dragon. With all the fresh faces wanting to prove themselves, we are guaranteed to see an exciting end to the season.
Six Races, Nine Days:
Once the season gets underway again the races will come thick and fast with three double headers, all in the space of nine days. Despite all taking place at the same venue, the Berlin Tempelhof, Formula E decided that there will be three different variations of the track, one for each of the double headers. On the fifth and sixth August, the drivers will drive the reverse layout of the traditional circuit, followed by the normal way around two days later on the eighth and ninth. However, for the final two races, we will see a new track, with turns four to fourteen given a complete shake up. These new circuits will add an extra dimension to the day as drivers have have to learn their way around and then race, all on the same day. Entertainment is certain to ensue.
More Environmentally Friendly Than Ever:
One of Formula E’s biggest selling points (at least for me) is it’s significantly better impact on the environment compared to other forms of motorsport. Any form of racing is going to have a negative impact on the environment, but being all electric, Formula E is going to be much better than that of the likes of Formula One. With all the races being at the same venue, the teams will not have to travel between events, greatly reducing their carbon footprint. Not only that, but the lack of spectators means less food and less travelling, both being two of the biggest contributing factors to the Climate Crisis. For people who love racing, but are concerned by Climate Change, the Big Berlin Finale is almost perfect.
In short, there’s many things to be excited about. Lots of racing, new drivers, championships wide open. The final six races of ABB FIA Formula E Championship are poised to be some of the greatest days of not only Formula E’s history, but arguably the entirety of motorsport.
Luca Ghiotto took his first win of the season in the Hungary sprint race, beating Callum Ilott after risking an alternative strategy to the rest of the field.
Ghiotto made a great start from fifth on the grid to second behind reverse polesitter Ilott. Behind, his Hitech teammate Nikita Mazepin continued his strong Hungaroring form to jump up to fourth place, while Jehan Daruvala slipped from the second row of the grid down to ninth.
Ghiotto and Ilott spent the opening phase of the race trading fastest laps as the Italian tried to put pressure on the lead, although Ilott was able to maintain a steady gap of over three seconds.
On lap 10 the first signs of the rapid tyre degradation that would define the race came when Louis Deletraz, struggling on softs, was passed by Mick Schumacher, Mazepin and Robert Shwartzman. On lap 13 Daruvala and Sean Gelael both stopped to change their own tyres, and were followed by Deletraz a lap later.
At the front Ilott was having the same struggles, as Ghiotto was able to close down the gap to the UNI-Virtuosi. On lap 17 Ilott, together with Schumacher and Shwartzman, finally stopped to change his worn mediums for softs. A slurry of pit stops then followed, leaving Ghiotto and Giuliano Alesi, the only drivers who elected not to change tyres, running first and second with half a minute in hand over Ilott.
But despite conceding track position, Ilott had a clear advantage from his fresher tyres. On lap 23 Ilott caught and passed Alesi, then began reeling in Ghiotto at a rate of almost five seconds a lap. On the penultimate lap Ilott was just 2.7s away from Ghiotto, which then became 0.7s when Ghiotto locked up through Turn 1.
However, Ilott was unable to affect a pass on Ghiotto on the final lap despite having much better traction through the corners, and Ghiotto was able to hold him off to win by four tenths.
Schumacher took his second consecutive third place after an assertive drive through the reverse grid field. Shwartzman finished fourth behind him, and Mazepin reinforced his strong form in yesterday’s feature race with fifth place. Deletraz recovered to sixth ahead of Daruvala, and Guanyu Zhou took three points with eighth place and the fastest lap.
After round 3 of the 2020 championship, Shwartzman holds an 18-point lead over Ilott. Christian Lundgaard remains third despite not scoring in either race at the Hungaroring, but is now only four points clear of Schumacher. In the teams’ standings, Prema have moved into the lead with 120 points, leading UNI-Virtuosi and ART.
Callum Ilott, UNI-Virtuosi (Clive Mason / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Trident’s David Beckmann took his first Formula 3 victory in the Hungaroring sprint race, having fought back to first after losing the lead at the start.
Beckmann started from reverse grid pole but had a slow getaway compared to Dennis Hauger starting from third. Hauger took the lead into the first corner and showed great pace in the wet conditions to move two seconds clear of Beckmann by the end of lap 2.
Beckmann responded in the following laps, reducing the gap to under a second by lap 7, before the safety car was deployed when Liam Lawson pulled off with an engine failure.
Dennis Hauger, Hitech (Dutch Photo Agency / Red Bull Content Pool)
When the race resumed on lap 10 Hauger jumped clear of Beckmann again. Meanwhile, Bent Viscaal had a great restart and passed his teammate Richard Verschoor for fifth, before then overtaking Logan Sargeant and Clement Novalak for third place by the end of the lap.
Viscaal continued charging, and on lap 13 the Dutchman moved into the lead after passing both Beckmann and then Hauger on the same lap. However, Viscaal was then handed a five-second penalty for causing a race-ending collision with Igor Fraga in the early laps, and was also placed under investigation for overtaking Sargeant off the track when taking fourth place.
As Viscaal set about trying to build a ten second gap to protect against a second penalty, Beckmann began pressuring Hauger for second place. The Danish driver was already six seconds adrift of Viscaal on lap 17 as his wet tyres struggled on the drying track, and he had little resistance to offer as Beckmann passed him on the inside of Turn 1.
Later on in the lap, Hauger then lost third place to Oscar Piastri, who had battled his way up the field from ninth on the grid.
Oscar Piastri, Prema (Courtesy of Prema Racing)
With five laps to go Beckmann struggled to bring the gap to Viscaal down beneath six seconds. But this wasn’t needed in the end, as the stewards awarded Viscaal another five-second penalty for his pass on Sargeant, which would drop Viscaal to third and hand Beckmann the victory.
However, Viscaal’s penalties were to become even more painful on lap 20, when Federico Malvestiti crashed out and caused the race to end under the safety car. Viscaal’s gap at the front was wiped out, and when he crossed the line his ten-second penalty dropped him from first all the way down to P17.
Hauger was promoted back into third for his maiden podium, with Piastri scoring valuable championship points with second place and the fastest lap.
Sargeant finished fourth ahead of Verschoor, with yesterday’s winner Theo Pourchaire in sixth and leading his ART teammates Aleksandr Smolyar and Sebastian Fernandez. Enzo Fittipaldi and Alex Peroni rounded out the top ten.
After round 3, Piastri’s double podium has extended his lead in the drivers’ standings, and he now has 26 points in hand over second-placed Sargeant. Pourchaire has dropped to third, and is now only half a point ahead of Beckmann following the German’s win. In the team’s standings Prema has 171 points, more than double the total of nearest rivals Trident and ART.
Formula 3 will be back in two weeks’ time, supporting the Formula 1 British Grand Prix at Silverstone.
Theo Pourchaire became the first double winner of the 2020 Formula 3 season at the Hungaroring feature race, seeing off championship leader Oscar Piastri through numerous restarts.
Starting in slippery conditions, the race opened with several incidents at the first corner bringing out the first safety car. Polesitter Aleksandr Smolyar was spun out of the race by Logan Sargeant, while behind them Frederik Vesti and Calan Williams came together to partially block the corner.
With Smolyar out and Sargeant driving a damaged car, Pourchaire moved up into the lead with Piastri second ahead of Sargeant. When the race resumed after a lap behind the safety car, Pourchaire immediately opened up a second over Piastri to protect against the DRS.
Piastri responded on lap five to bring the gap down to half a second. But before he could try a move on Pourchaire the race was interrupted once again when Liam Lawson pulled off with an engine fire, leaving a trail of oil throughout Turns 1 and 2. After one lap behind the safety car, the race was red-flagged to properly clear the track.
When the race resumed after a start behind the safety car, Pourchaire again bolted from Piastri and within two laps the Frenchman had broken out of DRS range again. From there Pourchaire kept improving, setting a series of fastest laps to add almost a second per lap on Piastri.
By the chequered flag, Pourchaire crossed the line more than twelve seconds clear of Piastri to take his second consecutive win of the season, and become the first double winner of the year.
Logan Sargeant, Prema (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Sargeant finished third behind Piastri to make it two Premas on the podium. Nursing damage throughout from the first corner collision with Smolyar, Sargeant was under pressure from both Lawson before his retirement and Sebastian Fernandez after the final safety car restart.
The American’s struggles were clear as he ran wide multiple times. However, he managed to hold onto the position until lap 15, when Fernandez’s tyres dropped off and he dropped behind the MP Motorsport pair of Richard Verschoor and Bent Viscaal.
As Verschoor and Viscaal then battled between themselves for fourth, Sargeant was able to pull away and comfortably keep his podium position. Behind, Viscaal came out on top with a last lap move through Turn 2, taking fourth place and his best F3 finish to date. Verschoor finished fifth and Fernandez was behind in sixth.
Alex Peroni finished in seventh, returning to the points for the first time since his podium in round one. Red Bull junior Dennis Hauger took his first F3 points in eighth place ahead of Clement Novalak, who rose 17 places from his grid position, and David Beckmann took the final point in tenth as well as pole position for tomorrow’s sprint race.
Dennis Hauger, Hitech (Dutch Photo Agency / Red Bull Content Pool)
FIA Formula 2 takes to Budapest’s Hungaroring this weekend for round three of the 2020 championship.
While the opening round of the season was dominated by returning drivers Callum Ilott and Guanyu Zhou, last weekend was the turn of F2’s rookies. Robert Shwartzman and Christian Lundgaard took their first victories in the series to assume the lead of championship from Ilott, while Yuki Tsunoda, Dan Ticktum and Marcus Armstrong all impressed with podium finishes.
When F2 arrives in Hungary these rookies will be aiming to build on that momentum and take charge of the championship. Expect to see Shwartzman come out of the gates strong as he tries to make up for retiring from last weekend’s sprint race, while Tsunoda will be hungry to reclaim the feature race win that was taken from him by a team radio failure in Austria.
Robert Shwartzman, Prema (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Mick Schumacher will also be one to watch this weekend. Not only will he come to Hungary with confidence from having won there in F2 last year, but he’s also on a much-improved run of form this time around.
In both rounds at the Red Bull Ring, Schumacher showed he had the pace to come away with at least a podium finish, if not a win. However, a spell of bad luck—including his fire extinguisher going off in his cockpit while running third last Sunday—means he’s currently lagging behind his title rivals, and will be pushing even harder this weekend to catch up.
And he won’t be the only one. Zhou will also be looking ahead to the Hungaroring weekend as a chance to get his championship campaign back on track. The Renault junior will be sorely disappointed after leading both feature races in Austria but coming away with only one podium, and will need to lay down a marker this weekend to avoid the title fight slipping away from him.
Guanyu Zhou, UNI-Virtuosi (Joe Portlock / Formula 1 via Getty Images)
Further back, the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend will also provide a much-needed reset for some of the drivers still yet to score any points.
Chief among these will be Hitech’s Luca Ghiotto. Used to being a title protagonist, Ghiotto’s best finish so far has been tenth in the second Austria sprint race, with an array of incidents and technical issues helping to keep him away from the points.
Also in need of a breakthrough soon is Jehan Daruvala. At the start of the season the Red Bull-backed driver talked up his goal of vying for an F1 seat with Alpha Tauri next year, but so far he’s had a mixed start to the season and is currently only P17 in the standings.
Daruvala has been solid in qualifying this year, starting both feature races well inside the top ten, but scruffy performances on race day mean he’s yet to convert any of those starts into points. With his Carlin teammate and fellow Red Bull junior Tsunoda already fighting for wins and podiums, Daruvala will need to tidy up his racecraft this weekend and make good on his pace if he wants to avoid losing Red Bull’s focus.
