New season, mega big hype!
A new season, new drivers, new reasons to cheer people on etc., and if you haven’t chosen which driver to support yet then make sure you do that now using the official driver selection flowchart.
Also new this year is the car. It’s got more downforce, more powerful DRS, more flexibility to actually fit drivers of different sizes in and generally more everything fast and good. It also looks and sounds like a cute little cartoon car. Something for everyone. Anyway the drivers apparently love it so at least they’ll all be happy for a few minutes.
Practice: No mega big hype?
Toyota’s WEC reserve driver Ritomo Miyata was (one of) the first out on track. Yay! (Yes, I will be over-enthusiastically supporting him for reasons that may or may not be related to my obsession with the #7 Toyota in WEC). Some other drivers drove for a bit and then Miyata had a spin. Oh no! But he recovered and carried on going fast. Yay! Meanwhile, Miyata’s teammate Zane Maloney was stopped at the end of the pit lane, waiting for his mechanics to come and rescue him. Ollie Bearman also stopped in the the pit lane, while Amaury Cordeel also had a little spin. Then it was the end of the session and Red Bull junior driver Isack Hadjar was the fastest, with Williams Academy driver Franco Colapinto second and Sauber junior driver Maloney third. A relatively normal practice session, to disappoint any press who wanted a story on how MEGA HYPED SUPER DRIVER Kimi Antonelli was ten minutes faster than everyone else, completing a lap so fast that he went back in time, or something.
Qualifying: Really, no mega big hype?
Ten minutes into Qualifying and MEGA HYPED SUPER DRIVER Kimi Antonelli was only fourth. Shocking. Young Aston Martin driver Jak Crawford had a spin but managed to keep himself going, while Campos couldn’t be bothered to send their drivers, Hadjar and Pepe Martí out of the pits.
With just over half of Qualifying already over, Mika Häkkinen protégée Kush Maini was on provisional pole, downtrodden Norwegian Dennis Hauger was second (he might not be downtrodden, I just feel sorry for him sometimes) and little shark Enzo Fittipaldi was third. That’s when Campos decided it was time to go. Hadjar immediately flew to the top of the time sheet, with Martí just behind. That spurred everyone else on and they were soon all out on track and trying to be fastest. First it was Fittipaldi who was fastest, then it was Maloney, then it was Hadjar again, then McLaren junior Gabriel Bortoleto and then Maini again. Basically the only two drivers not to have a go at the top spot were the Prema pair of MEGA HYPE and BIG HYPE SUPER DRIVER DUO Antonelli and Bearman, who were 17th and 18th respectively.
No one could beat Maini however, except the stewards who disqualified him for having a left undertray front external strake that was outside of the outlined threshold. You know, that thing? Guess his name isn’t Jeff after all…(?) Anyway, that meant that Bortoleto was on pole (does that mean Bortoleto is Jeff?), with Hadjar second and Maloney third, while Crawford was stopped on track and had to wait for someone to come and get him.
Sprint Race: Surely, some mega big hype?
Apparently ending your qualifying session stranded alone on track wasn’t such a bad plan because Crawford was on pole for the reverse grid Sprint Race. F2 newbie Taylor Barnard was behind in second and Alpine junior Victor Martins was third. Everyone set off for the first formation lap of the season, except Joshua Dürksen who couldn’t get going and had to be rolled off to start from the pit lane.
The start was chaotic, mostly probably because I don’t know who anyone is yet. How dare they change the colour of the cars they are driving? Crawford managed to keep the lead though, while O’Sullivan barged his way through from fifth to third and Barnard slipped down the field to nowhere. Then Rafael Villagómez crashed into Cordeel, giving himself a puncture and a ten-second penalty. Cordeel meanwhile was out, as was the Safety Car.
As the race resumed, Crawford and Martins started fighting it out over the lead of the race, while Maloney barged past Fittipaldi and O’Sullivan to take third, with O’Sullivan suffering further misery as Fittipaldi also overtook him. Maloney wasn’t done with his overtaking run, however, and had soon got past Martins for second place, while everyone had overtaken O’Sullivan and his rubbish slow hard tyres until he was in eighth place.
It wasn’t long before Maloney had caught race leader Crawford. They battled it out until Crawford had to accept defeat and Maloney disappeared far off down the road. Meanwhile O’Sullivan was complaining that Martí pushed him off track during an overtake, Colapinto was getting a ten-second stop/go penalty for being out of position at the start, MEGA HYPED SUPER DRIVER Antonelli was inexplicably pitting and Martins had crept up to Crawford to try and steal second place.
Because the pit stop went so well for Antonelli, Prema decided to do one for Bearman as well, while maybe Hitech should have considered the same for their driver as Juan Manuel Correa complained “my mirrors are falling off…” Things were also going well for Martins, who made a mistake, allowing Hadjar and eventually Martí by into third and fourth place. At least Martins got to carry on though, unlike Barnard who quietly retired from somewhere near the back and presumably hated everything about his first F2 race.
The Red Bull junior battle intensified as Hadjar and Martí fought over third place. “Are we fighting or not?” Martí asked of his teammate Hadjar. “In theory not,” replied his team. In practice though Martí was flying by Hadjar into third place to take the final podium position just in time (several laps) for the end of the race. At the front, Maloney was a happy winner, while Crawford was a slightly disappointed second-place person.
Feature Race: Maloney, mega big hype?
After Maini’s earlier disqualification, Bortoleto was on pole, Hadjar second and Maloney third. Bortoleto’s plan was to have a good start, manage his tyres and have a great pit stop, while Maloney’s plan was to overtake him and Hadjar by starting on the faster soft tyres. Presumably Hadjar also had a plan but we’ll never know.
Maloney’s plan went smoothly, making a lightning fast start and overtaking Bortoleto and Hadjar for the lead. Hadjar also had a good start and had got ahead of Bortoleto until Bortoleto ran into the back of him, tipping Hadjar into a spin. Hadjar was left stranded sideways on the track while a helpless Fittipaldi ploughed into the side of him. Hadjar and Fittipaldi’s races were over, Bortoleto got a ten-second penalty and the Safety Car was deployed.

The top three were now Maloney, O’Sullivan and Hauger. Bortoleto had dropped to fourth, with Martí fifth and Aron sixth. Bearman, meanwhile, was in the pits, because random pit stops is now apparently a Prema thing? As the Safety Car finished its work and the race restarted, Martí took advantage of his super-fast soft tyres and overtook Bortoleto and Hauger, taking third place. Crawford then followed Martí’s lead, making light work of Hauger and Bortoleto, also thanks to his super-fast soft tyres. Martí wasn’t content with third though, and soon stormed by O’Sullivan for second place.
Going in the opposite direction, backwards, was Correa, who seemed to have some issue before heading to the pits to retire. For everyone else, the first wave of pit stops was beginning. Barnard’s pit stop was particularly slow and with all that time sitting in the pits he came out again just to declare “my rear right tyre is not fitted properly,” presumably hating everything about his second F2 race. Bearman, however, had problems even getting into the pits as he and Cordeel headed to the pit entry at the same time. Cordeel, taking an unusually wide line, confused Bearman and the whole thing ended with them bashing into each other. Cordeel later retired and got a five-place grid drop for the next race for causing the collision.
Also having great pit stops were Richard Verschoor, who got a five-second penalty for speeding in the pit lane, and Crawford whose car stopped and the team were unable to get it going again, neither with the car starty stick nor the laptop. Paul Aron then also got a five-second time penalty for speeding in the pit lane, not that anyone would know because the STUPID GRAPHIC doesn’t actually say. It’s fine, who doesn’t ENJOY having to check FIA decision documents mid-race just to understand what is happening. Luckily we didn’t need the FIA decision documents to see that Martins car was broken. He was stopped on track and the Safety Car was called just as everyone had finished their pit stops, everyone except Maini who smugly (probably not smugly actually, he doesn’t seem at all smug) rolled into the pit lane to take his stop while everyone else was driving really slowly.
During the Safety Car, Martí tried to tell on O’Sullivan for not slowing down properly for the yellow flags, while Villagómez got a five-second penalty for something, but WHO KNOWS WHAT!? (Speeding in the pit lane). Anyway, that order of the cars by this point was Maloney still in the lead with O’Sullivan now back to second, Martí third, Hauger fourth, Verschoor fifth and Aron sixth.
When the racing got back underway, with just over ten laps to go, it was frantic. Maloney put his foot down to pull out a lead, Aron overtook everyone (two people) and was soon fourth, Martí was told by his team to be more aggressive, Maini was ploughing through the field, and we finally got to see some MEGA HYPE SUPER DRIVER Antonelli overtaking action. With five laps to go, O’Sullivan was once again struggling with his tyres and soon Martí and Aron had overtaken him. While the mid-field battles were intense, up front Maloney was over four seconds ahead, cruising to victory with Martí behind him in second and Aron taking third despite his penalty. The F2 weekend double for Maloney and an (almost) perfect start to the season.
Arguably the best part of the race was the green room afterwards with three very chatty F2 drivers. I seriously could have watched that all day, if only they didn’t have to keep muting the sound for constant swearing. I’ll leave you with these heartwarming words from Aron: “Mate, these races are so fun!”
Championship standings: Maloney mega big hype!
After the first round I’m sure it’s no surprise to anyone that Maloney is firmly in the lead of the championship (36 points); Martí is second (24 points) and Aron third (19 points). Bortoleto and O’Sullivan are close behind in fourth (15 points) and fifth (14 points). Antonelli is only 12th, he apparently doesn’t get MEGA HYPE points to launch him up the leaderboard. Strange.