2023 Jeddah Formula 2 round

After winning the Feature Race in Bahrain quite dominantly, Théo Pourchaire entered the round as the championship leader with 32 points, with current runner-up Ralph Boschung only being four points adrift from the Frenchman. Carlin driver and rookie Zane Maloney was ranked third with 15 points.[1]

Campos Racing entered the round as the Teams' Championship leader by scoring a total of 42 points, with ART Grand Prix being four points behind the Spanish team in second, while MP Motorsport as the reigning Teams' Champion currently was ranked sixth with eleven points.[2]

After a dominant qualiying session in Sakhir two weeks ago, ART Grand Prix drew all the attention at the grid whether the French team could once again dominate qualifying – they did this time with Victor Martins, who took pole position by 0.744 seconds ahead of Oliver Bearman. Championship leader Pourchaire, who took pole position in Sakhir, qualified in third, while rookie driver Jak Crawford took reverse grid pole after qualifying tenth.[3]

All 22 drivers came through the first corners at the start, with Jak Crawford maintaining the lead into the first lap ahead of fellow Red Bull Junior Team driver Ayumu Iwasa, who overtook Boschung into turn 1. Just one lap later, Iwasa would hold on to overtake Crawford to become the leader of the Sprint Race, before a spin from Zane Maloney – another Red Bull Junior – caused the first Safety Car period of the race. Iwasa and Boschung initially were able to build a gap to the rest of the grid, before the Safety Car once again was deployed after an avoidable collision between Théo Pourchaire and Oliver Bearman into turn 1, forcing both drivers to retire from the race with terminal damage. In an intense second half of the race, Iwasa hung on to win the Sprint Race ahead of Victor Martins, who charged through the field after starting in tenth, and Jehan Daruvala. Boschung, Iwasa, Vesti, Doohan and Hauger took the final points positions.[4]

Polesitter Victor Martins immediately lost the lead at the start to Prema's Oliver Bearman, whilst his teammate Frederik Vesti even managed to progress himself to fourth position after starting in P8. Similar to the Sprint Race the previous day, the first retirement occurred on lap 2 when Brad Benavides collided with Amaury Cordeel on the approach to turn 1, forcing Benavides to retire and Cordeel to come into the pits to change his damaged front wing. Meanwhile, Martins and Bearman battled against each other for the race lead after completing their respective mandatory pitstop, with Vesti and Doohan hanging on their tails in third and fourth respectively. Martins subsequently took the lead from the Brit on lap 11, while Vesti took benefit and managed to get past Bearman for second place. However, unforeseen events took overhand when Bearman and Martins spun out of contention on lap 16 and 18 respectively. Bearman was able to continue but dropped down to P10, whereas Martins was forced to retire after stalling the engine in his second consecutive Feature Race, resulting in Vesti to take the lead of the race ahead of Doohan. The Danish driver ultimately claimed his first Feature Race win in Formula 2 ahead of the Australian driver, whilst Jehan Daruvala once again drove to the podium by finishing in third ahead of previous winner Iwasa. Dennis Hauger finished in the top 5 by making the alternative strategy work such as Richard Verschoor after starting from P20, Enzo Fittipaldi, Arthur Leclerc and Isack Hadjar. After his spin midway through the race, Bearman was able to take his first point in Formula 2 by finishing tenth. However, Théo Pourchaire who entered the round as the championship leader, lost his lead to Ralph Boschung after scoring no points during the weekend, with the latter leading the championship for the first time in his career.[5]

Pos.	No.	Driver	Entrant	Time/Gap	Grid SR	Grid FR
1	6	Victor Martins	ART Grand Prix	1:41.326	10	1
2	8	Oliver Bearman	Prema Racing	+0.744	8	2
3	5	Théo Pourchaire	ART Grand Prix	+0.745	7	81
4	14	Jack Doohan	Invicta Virtuosi Racing	+0.784	6	3
5	2	Jehan Daruvala	MP Motorsport	+0.785	5	4
6	11	Ayumu Iwasa	DAMS	+0.794	4	5
7	7	Frederik Vesti	Prema Racing	+0.969	91	6
8	24	Kush Maini	Campos Racing	+1.034	3	7
9	25	Ralph Boschung	Campos Racing	+1.171	2	9
10	9	Jak Crawford	Hitech Pulse-Eight	+1.227	1	10
11	21	Clément Novalak	Trident	+1.250	162	11
12	23	Juan Manuel Correa	Van Amersfoort Racing	+1.291	11	12
13	12	Arthur Leclerc	DAMS	+1.303	12	13
14	4	Enzo Fittipaldi	Rodin Carlin	+1.360	13	14
15	1	Dennis Hauger	MP Motorsport	+1.428	14	15
16	20	Roman Staněk	Trident	+1.469	212	16
17	3	Zane Maloney	Rodin Carlin	+1.493	15	17
18	16	Roy Nissany	PHM Racing by Charouz	+1.528	17	18
19	10	Isack Hadjar	Hitech Pulse-Eight	+1.753	18	19
20	22	Richard Verschoor	Van Amersfoort Racing	+2.059	19	20
21	15	Amaury Cordeel	Invicta Virtuosi Racing	+2.410	20	21
22	17	Brad Benavides	PHM Racing by Charouz	+3.701	22	22
107% time: 1:48.418 (+7.092)
Source:[6]

Notes

• ^1 – Frederik Vesti received a five-place grid drop for causing a collision with Richard Verschoor in the Sakhir Feature Race. The penalty will apply to the next race that the Dane participates in.[7]
• ^2 – Clément Novalak and Roman Staněk have received five-place grid penalties for Saturday's Sprint Race after Trident mechanics were found to have failed to hand back both drivers’ set of tyres into parc fermé. Team personnel were also found to have worked on the sets of tyres before handing them in, breaching the Sporting Regulations, dropping down both drivers to P16 and P21 respectively.[8]

Pos.	No.	Driver	Entrant	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	7	Frederik Vesti	Prema Racing	28	50:45.587	6	25
2	14	Jack Doohan	Invicta Virtuosi Racing	28	+3.959	3	18
3	2	Jehan Daruvala	MP Motorsport	28	+7.546	4	15
4	11	Ayumu Iwasa	DAMS	28	+11.379	5	12
5	1	Dennis Hauger	MP Motorsport	28	+11.712	15	10
6	22	Richard Verschoor	Van Amersfoort Racing	28	+14.014	20	8
7	4	Enzo Fittipaldi	Rodin Carlin	28	+14.220	14	6
8	12	Arthur Leclerc	DAMS	28	+17.012	13	4 (1)
9	10	Isack Hadjar	Hitech Pulse-Eight	28	+21.646	19	2
10	8	Oliver Bearman	Prema Racing	28	+23.910	2	1
11	16	Roy Nissany	PHM Racing by Charouz	28	+28.854	18
12	24	Kush Maini	Campos Racing	28	+29.371	7
13	5	Théo Pourchaire	ART Grand Prix	28	+31.238	83
14	20	Roman Staněk	Trident	28	+32.019	16
15	9	Jak Crawford	Hitech Pulse-Eight	28	+32.973	10
16	21	Clément Novalak	Trident	28	+36.131	11
17	3	Zane Maloney	Rodin Carlin	28	+37.076	17
18	23	Juan Manuel Correa	Van Amersfoort Racing	28	+40.339	12
19	25	Ralph Boschung	Campos Racing	28	+47.097	9
20	15	Amaury Cordeel	Invicta Virtuosi Racing	28	+1:31.499	21
DNF	6	Victor Martins	ART Grand Prix	16	Spun off	1	(2)
DNF	17	Brad Benavides	PHM Racing by Charouz	1	Collision damage	22
Fastest lap set by Arthur Leclerc: 1:43.647 (lap 26)
Source:[6]

Notes:

• ^3 – Prior to the Feature Race, Théo Pourchaire received a five-place grid penalty for causing an avoidable collision with Oliver Bearman during Saturday's Sprint Race.[9]