Official F1 Journal Formula 2 Friday Round Up - Belgium Grand Prix

26/7/2024

Formula 2 returns this weekend for Round 10 at Circuit of Spa-Francorchamps for the last round before the summer break.

Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium is a 7.004km track with 18 corners. Soft and medium tyres are used for F2, with last years feature winning strategy being 16 laps on medium tyres and 9 on soft tyres. Last year Doohan won the race after starting in P11.

The lap record for this circuit is 1:56.054 (De Vries, 2018). This years sprint race will consist of 18 laps and the feature race will consist of 25 laps.

Season Stats

Invicta Racing lead the Teams’ Standings for the first time this season with the Norfolk-based squad overtaking Campos Racing to go onto 184 points.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s Budapest Feature Race win marked the first time PREMA Racing have won on three consecutive weekends since Baku-Monte Carlo-Barcelona 2023.
In Budapest, Victor Martins became the fourth driver to achieve two podiums in one weekend this season, joining Zane Maloney, Dennis Hauger and Enzo Fittipaldi in doing so.

Weekend Schedule

Practice

Top Ten Results
1) Isack Hadjar 1:58.730
2) Victor Martins +0.010
3) Kimi Antonelli +0.447
4) Paul Aron +0.584
5) Amaury Cordeel +0.638
6) Dennis Hauger +0.661
7) Zak O'Sullivan +0.808
8) Franco Colapinto +0.865
9) Jak Crawford +0.901
10) Gabriel Bortoleto +0.971

Isack Hadjar continued his domination in the practice session of the Spa-Francorchamps weekend. However Campos Racing still say there was still room for improvement before qualifying.

At the start of the session the track was damp and all the drivers staying in the pits until the track was fully dry, leaving little time at the end for drivers to do minimal laps.

There was a brief red flag with just 23 minutes to go as Rafael Villagomez hit the barriers out of Turn 9. With 14 minutes left in the session the green flag came out and there was a rush to get running underway again.

Qualifying

Top Ten Results
1) Paul Aron 1:56.959
2) Gabriel Bortoleto +0.168
3) Isack Hadjar +0.282
4) Jak Crawford +0.423
5) Kimi Antonelli +0.438
6) Zane Maloney +0.547
7) Franco Colapinto +0.724
8) Richard Verschoor +0.789
9) Dennis Hauger +0.815
10) Zak O'Sullivan +0.823

All drivers started the session on their soft tyres, but running didn't last long as Victor Martins stopped on the track, and the red flag came out briefly while Martins car was removed.

The red flag was terrible news for all the drivers already on flying laps when the red flag was brought out. Duerksen was one of those drivers, and once the red flag was cleared, his tyres had very little life left, and he went slower in the first sector than on his previous lap.

Hadjar was the first to top the leaderboard with a time of 1:56.803, ahead of Aron by one-tenth, Bortoleto, Antonelli and Maloney.

As Hadjar pits, Aron, Bearman, and Fittipaldi head back out for another flying lap. Bearman and Fittipaldi both improve, but Aron aborts his lap and heads into the pits.

With seven minutes to go the drivers headed back out, with Aron going fastest ahead of Crawford, Maloney and Hadjar. O'Sullivan can only manage 10th place and put himself on pole for the reverse grid.

Aron takes pole for Sunday's feature race for the second consecutive weekend, ahead of Bortoleto, Hadjar, Crawford, Antonelli, Maloney, Colapinto, Verschoor, Hauger and O'Sullivan.

Full Qualifying Results

1) Paul Aron 1:56.959
2) Gabriel Bortoleto +0.168
3) Isack Hadjar +0.282
4) Jak Crawford +0.423
5) Kimi Antonelli +0.438
6) Zane Maloney +0.547
7) Franco Colapinto +0.724
8) Richard Verschoor +0.789
9) Dennis Hauger +0.815
10) Zak O'Sullivan +0.823
11) A Cordeel +0.842
12) K Maini +0.845
13) E Fittipaldi +0.862
14) J Correa +0.954
15) O Bearman +1.020
16) R Miyata +1.104
17) J Marti +1.161
18) R Villagomez +1.230
19) T Barnard +1.829
20) J Durksen +2.113
21) R Stanek +2.500

Anny Wooldridge
Writer at F1 Journal

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