The golden rule of motorsport, “never hit your teammate”. Tell that to the F2 drivers. Teammate crashing was so prevalent this season I didn’t even need to research this post. These are just the ones I remember happening, who knows what other dark things lurked in the chaos of this season’s races…
The moment everyone had been either over-excitedly waiting for (Wow!! The championship decider on this completely crazy weird new chaos track!!) or generally grumbling about (What!? The championship decider on this completely crazy weird new chaos track!?) finally arrived. The randomness of the whole situation was further enhanced by Lewis Hamilton getting COVID and the driver shuffling that then ensued, resulting in Jack Aitken being promoted to F1 duties at Williams and my favourite F2 blogger Ralph Boschung making an early comeback with Campos (having previously announced that he would have the seat in 2021). Oh and of course we had the small matter of who was going to win the F2 championship to think about…
F2 is back and so is Sean Gelael, following his strange spine fracturing accident, which means goodbye Vips. Hughes is also out as F2 makes way for its youngest entrant ever in the form of surprise F3 runner-up Théo Pourchaire. Surely a nice warm-up for his 2021 season. Other changes since we last raced include Dan Ticktum’s hair colour and a few driver announcements, but nothing of note…
We know all the F2 guys are great at being racing drivers, but the question everyone wants an answer to is just how rockstar are they? (Yes, everyone is asking that). Inspired by the success of the AWS F1 fastest driver ratings, I have put my time during the long F2 break to good use and developed my own algorithm…
Just because the drivers had a whole week off before Russia, doesn’t mean they were taking it easy. Ticktum was busy playing Call of Duty and doing podcasts, Zhou did an F1 test with Renault and Delétraz did a little thing called Le Mans, which was going well until the last hour when the car started to give up and he hit a wall. Classic Le Mans heartbreak. The teams were also busy switching drivers around, with F3 driver Jake Hughes replacing Alesi at HWA, Alesi replacing Matsushita at MP, and Matsushita deciding to do something else instead…
This round promised to be exciting just because Mugello. At the very least it’s nice to look at. “Have you raced here before?” was the key question of the weekend. The answer was mostly no…
Practice at the Temple of Speed is all about testing the limits. Shwartzman tested the limits of the turn one braking zone, when he missed it and went straight on down the escape road. Drugovich tested the limits of the tow effect, after almost running into the back of Nissany at the end of the straight. Everyone tested the track limits, with gravel being thrown all over the road and track times being deleted left, right and centre (aka turn 11). Samaia tested the limits of his car, which broke in a massive plume of smoke, causing a Virtual Safety Car…
There were many touching and emotional moments as F2 returned to Spa for the first time following the tragic death of Anthoine Hubert last year, with AH19 logos adorning every car, helmet and person. There were also a couple of different faces in the F2 paddock this week, with Juan-Manuel Correa the special guest of honour, paying his respects to Hubert, sharing how Anthoine had given him strength and motivation through his recovery, and how he aims to be back in F2 next year. I honestly couldn’t think of anything I’d like to see more. Another new face was Jüri Vips, who was replacing Sean Gelael and his fractured vertebrae from last round’s mystery accident. Vips would be hoping for something good to actually happen for his career in 2020, having been a casualty of coronavirus logistics messing up his original racing plans and basically destroying his hopes of getting a super license and F1 career. No big deal. I’m sure they’re giving him plenty of sympathy, love and support in the Red Bull young driver programme…
It was co-commentator Alex Brundle who first offered up this round’s proposal for understatement of the season, when stating that “Lundgaard struggled with tyre degradation last weekend,” (he wore his tyre out completely until it entirely fell apart, left him driving about on three wheels and destroyed his whole race, but sure I guess there was a struggle involved)…
This week we were transported back in time to 1950, and not because it was the 70th Anniversary grand prix, but because Peter Windsor was in the commentary box. Who doesn’t prefer historical anecdotes over racing that’s actually happening right here, right now? What a treat!
