F2 Austria: Richard Verschoor wins with gamble in feature race
10th July 2022Trident’s Richard Verschoor converted his gamble, to start the Austrian race on the dry tyres, into the Formula 2 feature race win.
How the race unfolded…
Because the track was wet, in the F3 race prior, the field was mixed between the full, blue-ringed, wet tyres and the slick purple-ring supersoft dry tyres. Those at the front opted for the wet tyres while the back of the pack were mixed between the wets and dry tyre compounds.
Once the lights went out, Hitech’s Juri Vips got a fantastic start off the line and managed to lead into turn one ahead of Dams’ Ayumu Iwasa, who took P2 from ART’s Frederik Vesti. As the pack reached turn three, Vips bolted away into the lead to establish a healthy gap between himself while Vesti worked to regain P2 into the fourth corner – which he did.
The yellow flag was soon brough out, at the exit of turn three, as Hitech’s Marcus Armstrong stopped on the at the side of the track. As a result, the safety car was deployed. During the stoppage, Van Amersfoort Racing’s Amuary Cordeel was seen in the pit lane to swap his wet tyres for the dry-slick tyres. However, the VAR driver would have to make another stop as Cordeel’s stop was outside the legal window.
The safety car finally peeled back into the pit lane at the end of lap four. As a result, Vips bolted away from Vesti on the run down into turn nine. This decision allowed the Hitech driver to lead into turn one with minimal pressure from those behind.
On lap six, the pendulum begun to swing in favour of the drivers who started the race on slick tyres as the dry tyre runners began to catch up to the leaders. On lap seven, Trident’s Richard Verschoor – who started P8 – took the race lead from Vips on the exit of turn three.
As the strategies crossed over, between the wets and the slicks, the order changed dramatically. Verschoor led the race ahead of Prema’s Jehan Daruvala, in P2, and Campos’ Roberto Merhi in P3. While the former race leader, Vips, dropped down to P16 after his mandatory stop.
The strategy played off very, very well for the likes of Merhi who had made up 19 positions as he occupied second-place by lap 12.
Out of the runners who opted to start on the dry slicks, Daruvala was the first driver to pull off into the pit lane to swap his supersoft tyres for the yellow-ringed mediums, at the end of lap 12.
At the halfway point, on lap 20, Vesti was given a five-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage.
Four laps later, Virtuosi Racing’s Jack Doohan soon joined Vesti with his own five-second time penalty – albeit for exceeding track limits. However, it went from bad to worse for Doohan as he was given a further 10-second time penalty for exceeding track limits.
Iwasa was yet another driver to receive a five-second time penalty for exceeding track limits, as the session crept into its final laps. Vesti and Carlin’s Liam Lawson had also become recipients of track limit, five-second penalties.
On the penultimate lap, Mehri climbed back up to P2 after he lost the position to Daruvala earlier on. The Campos driver made a move up into turn three, and with better traction remained side-by-side with the Prema driver as they raced into turn four.
Mehri had the inside line into turn four and managed outbrake the Prema, to remain ahead. However, as he finished off the lap the Campos was given a five-second time penalty for track limits which – at the end – demoted him down to P5.
Podium:
- Richard Verschoor, Trident
- Jehan Daruvala, Prema
- Logan Sargeant, Carlin
That’s it for the article: F2 Austria: Richard Verschoor wins with gamble in feature race! What did you think of the feature race? Let us know in the comments!
Read more Formula Two here:
- F2 Austrian GP: Marcus Armstrong leads sprint from start to finish
- F2 Austrian GP: Frederik Vesti claims pole in eventful qualifying
- 2022 British GP: Logan Sargeant secures pole in superb performance
- Hitech GP to give Juri Vips chance to ‘redeem himself’
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Hi, I’m Kamron. I created ApexMotorsports.co.uk in the dying embers of the 2021 Formula 1 world championship. It allowed me freedom to write whatever I wanted to write about which was all things motorsports, my passion.
I have put a lot of effort in over the years to keep this website in its best shape and I’ve loved seeing the brand grow consistently, month-on-month, year-on-year. My ambition is to keep watching this brand grow into a primary outlet of news for all things motorsports whilst fueling my desire to pursue a career in sports journalism, specialising in motorsports.
Kamron Kent
Hi, I'm Kamron. I created ApexMotorsports.co.uk in the dying embers of the 2021 Formula 1 world championship. It allowed me freedom to write whatever I wanted to write about which was all things motorsports, my passion. I have put a lot of effort in over the years to keep this website in its best shape and I've loved seeing the brand grow consistently, month-on-month, year-on-year. My ambition is to keep watching this brand grow into a primary outlet of news for all things motorsports whilst fueling my desire to pursue a career in sports journalism, specialising in motorsports.
