DRUUUGOOOOO!
Back to good old familiar Barcelona and all the excitement it usually holds. There’s always so much to look forward to, such as lots of talk about tyre degradation that will probably never happen but is our only hope as overtaking isn’t a thing, or how well everyone knows this track because *surprise* it’s used for testing. Also Cem Bölükbasi was back after his injury. Welcome back Cem!
Practice: Dru-go-fast
Practice started with everyone driving around slowly and not really setting any times until Olli Caldwell lost control and crashed into a barrier, resulting in a broken car and a red flag. However, the following ten-minute red-flag period didn’t mean a lack of action, as we got an extreme close-up of Red Bull junior Jehan Daruvala’s ultra-long eyelashes.
With 27 minutes to go, the green flags were waving and everyone was heading back out on track, except Sauber junior Théo Pourchaire who had stalled and had to wait for EVERYONE to go past before he could also go out to drive around and not set lap times. Meanwhile, half of the bad-luck duo (aka the Hitech drivers) Marcus Armstrong had spun and was beached in the gravel trap. Cue another red flag.
With 13 minutes left to go and the session once more fully underway, the drivers finally decided to do some proper laps. Dennis Hauger was fastest, then Felipe Drugovich was fastest, then Daruvala was in the gravel trap but managed to avoid doing an Armstrong.
And thus concluded what managed to be a very boring session, despite two red flags. Oh and Drugovich was fastest, Daruvala second and Logan Sargeant was third.
Qualifying: Dru-no! Look out for Pourchaire!
It was time for Jüri Vips to come back down to the reality of a clunky F2 car following his F1 free practice debut with Red Bull. Ralph Boschung, however, wasn’t able to get back in his clunky F2 car because he had a neck problem. His withdrawal from the weekend was sad because Boschung is my FAV, but equally good because he seems to have a man’s face on the side of his car these days. I don’t draw faces, so I’m happy to have the risk of tackling that one pushed until the next round. Armstrong, Drugovich and Richard Verschoor were sitting in their clunky F2 cars, but staying in the pits while everyone else headed out to do their first qualifying laps.
In the early phase of the session, Daruvala was the fastest and then the middle phase was a bit boring so we got a replay of Marino Sato hitting a bollard and a shot of Hauger having a drink.
With five minutes to go, Jack Doohan was going very fast, while Daruvala was already out of the car, having finished his laps. Daruvala was soon down to third, behind Doohan and Frederik Vesti. With two minutes to go, there was a weird calm, until Drugovich got in the way of Pourchaire and Pourchaire did lots of shouting.
As the chequered flag flew, Vips (who was last) crossed the line to do a final lap. He was flying, all purple sectors and fast times. It was very exciting. Would he take pole from Doohan? No. Two tenths of a second too slow, Vips finished in second place, just ahead of Vesti.
Sprint Race: Dru-go-go-gadget* race start
It was Drugovich who qualified in tenth and therefore should have started the Sprint Race from pole, however he got a grid-drop penalty for impeding Pourchaire and instead was starting fourth. That promoted Calan Williams to pole position, which probably would have been exciting for him, except he stalled on the formation lap and had to be pushed away for a pit-lane start. Jake Hughes was starting second and Pourchaire third.
Drugovich didn’t let the penalty get in his way though, launching himself into the lead right from the beginnings, with Hughes and Pourchaire both having bad starts and leaving Ayumu Iwasa and Logan Sargeant to take second and third. Basically everyone shuffled positions a bit, but very carefully so as not to crash, except Roy Nissany who spun. Sixth-placed Vips’s attempt to get past Daruvala was one of a number of failed attempts at overtaking throughout the field in the first few laps, however his ended more tragically than most, as shortly after he spun and ended up in the gravel, looking annoyed and pained. The Safety Car was deployed. Amaury Cordeel was probably also feeling annoyed and pained as he then got a ten-second stop/go penalty for being out of position at the Safety Car line.
After a very orderly restart, they drove around in formation for a while. It was so dull that when, a few laps later, DRS was enabled and Caldwell overtook Bölükbasi for 15th place I genuinely cheered. On lap 18, I also diligently noted “I’m bored”.
Then Daruvala gave us the action we were all craving, by overtaking Hughes for fourth place, but then it seemed actually it was Hughes who was struggling as everyone overtook him and he went to the pits. Thankfully, watching Hughes being overtaken filled the rest of the race time and then it was over. Drugovich won and Iwasa and Sargeant got to experience their first F2 podiums. I’m sure they loved it, but I was too bored to even watch that. Maybe it was really exciting and they had a champagne fight and sang songs.
(*Yes, that is a reference to an 80s kids television programme)
Feature Race: Dru-shows his talent
It was Doohan, Vips and Vesti in the top-three grid slots. Vesti was all smiles and positivity, to counteract Vips’s bad luck misery cloud, explaining that “it’s going to be very difficult”. Doohan was worried about his championship and may well have just said “POINTS, GIVE ME POINTS!”
The start was all shuffling about for position, but in a very careful fashion, and by the first corner Doohan was still in the lead, while Vesti had passed Vips for second. Down in the lower-mid-field, Caldwell was getting crammed into a tangle of cars, until Hauger clattered into him, dropping Caldwell to the back of the field. Hauger also suffered and received a five-second penalty for his indiscretion.
Just a few laps later and there was more drama, as Daruvala’s car had very suddenly broken down in the middle of the track, surprising not only Daruvala but also Iwasa who was right behind him and desperately trying (unsuccessfully) to take avoiding action. Daruvala was out of the race, Iwasa was off to the pits for a new front wing and the Safety Car was deployed.
Once the Safety Car period was over, Vips came to the pits for his mandatory stop, including a few extra seconds while his mechanics had issues. The pit problems meant that Vips came out behind Hughes who (having pitted at the same time) had been far behind in eighth place before the stops. Classic Vips luck.
Soon everyone had pitted apart from Drugovich (who was now in the lead) and all those on the alternative tyre strategy. Drugovich, with his apparently magical skills to keep going on tyres that should long have worn out, was told by his team to just go fast and let them know when he wanted to pit. Meanwhile Doohan was probably feeling quite stressed about his potential win, as Drugovich was going so fast he had almost managed to pull out a gap that was large enough for him to take his pit stop and still come out ahead of Doohan (who had already pitted).
When Drugovich finally pitted, it was a bit of a slow stop, but not Vips-levels of slow, and he came out in ninth place behind Vesti, which once all the alternative strategy drivers had pitted would be overall third. On his newer tyres, it didn’t take Drugovich long to overtake Vesti and begin hunting down Doohan. To add to the drama, the stewards decided to issue a cryptic message about Drugovich being under investigation for a pit-lane infringement that would be looked at after the race. After close inspection, from multiple camera angles, of all aspects of Drugovich’s pit stop, it became clear that no one had any idea what this was about, including his team.
After everyone had made their pit stops, Doohan and Drugovich resumed their positions at the front of the race, both pushing hard and well ahead of third-placed Vesti. A few laps later and Drugovich had caught up to Doohan and, once more, was able to breeze by to take the lead on his fresher tyres. Still panicked about a potential penalty for the mystery pit-stop infringement, Drugovich’s team told him to keep going fast and pull as much of a gap to Doohan as possible. So after conserving his soft tyres ages longer than anyone else and overtaking two cars to take the lead of the race, he continued his impressive run by speeding down the road, with the stewards’ threat hanging over him.
Further down the field, there was some serious overtaking happening by those on the alternative strategy, now on fast new soft tyres, against those struggling on older, harder tyres. The pinnacle of this overtaking fest was a triple, simultaneous overtake by Clément Novalak, Enzo Fittipaldi and Marcus Armstrong on Pourchaire, Lawson and Williams for fifth, seventh and ninth places. This was followed by yet more overtakes in the last two laps, presumably leaving Novalak, Fittipaldi and Armstrong very pleased with their choice to risk it with a different tyre strategy.
Drugovich cruised flew across the finish line, still pushing to keep a gap to Doohan, although apparently it wasn’t necessary because whatever was wrong with his pit stop didn’t seem to have actually been wrong. Drugovich couldn’t believe his win, Doohan didn’t understand it and Vesti was just happy.
Novalak battled Sargeant to the line, but lost out on fourth place by 0.3 seconds, while Fittipaldi was sixth and Armstrong seventh (having started 11th, 13th and 15th). A good day for the alternative strategy, which probably left Daruvala (who started fourth and on the harder tyres) wondering what he could have done had his car not broken on him…
Dru-goes back to the top of the championship standings
After a MASSIVE points haul for Drugovich, he is unsurprisingly back at the top of the championship points table (86 points), while Pourchaire’s modest points haul from a quiet weekend managed to stop him dropping too far down; he’s now second (60 points). Despite his Feature Race disappointment, Daruvala is still in third place (41 points), while Lawson keeps fourth (36 points). Armstrong and Sargeant are both on 36 points, in fifth and sixth place respectively.
Also, Monaco starts today and I’m hoping Boschung is back. Expect a unique combination of carnage and processional “racing”.