Aussie Watch: Doohan demolishes F2® field with win in Budapest
Monday, 24 July 2023
Jack Doohan took his first victory of the FIA Formula 2® season in dominating style in Hungary, while Christian Mansell was again the standout of Australia's three FIA Formula 3® entrants.
Jack Doohan has dominated the FIA Formula 2® Feature in Hungary, the Australian winning his first race of the season from pole position after leading all 37 laps in Budapest on Sunday.
The Invicta Virtuosi Racing driver was in a league of his own at the Hungaroring, where he took the second of his four F2® career wins in the Sprint last year.
The 20-year-old edged Frenchman Victor Martins (ART) by 0.052secs for pole position on Friday, and simply drove away from the pack on Sunday, repelling championship leader Frederik Vesti (Prema Racing) in the early stages and extending his opening stint on the soft tyre to perfection, pitting on lap 25 with a six-second lead to take medium tyres for the run to the chequered flag.
With fresh rubber, Doohan then pulled the pin, setting fastest lap after fastest lap in the closing stages and recording a 1min 30.997secs lap on the penultimate tour to win by 9.110 seconds. He bagged a perfect 28 points from the Feature – 25 points for the win, two points for pole and an extra point for fastest lap.
The victory was Doohan's first since the Feature race in Belgium last year, and saw him vault to fifth place in the championship standings with 100 points, 18 of the season's 26 races now in the books.
"Just a perfect race, the car was unbelievable," Doohan said.
"Finally (a win), 10 rounds too late! I'm stoked. To have a race like that, the soft tyre stint was awesome and the car was on rails.
"I could just do exactly what I wanted. On the prime (tyre), the medium, it was even better. We've worked hard for this, and the car was awesome."
Doohan is the 10th different winner in 18 F2 races this year, with Vesti (153 points) extending his advantage at the top of the standings over Theo Pourchaire to 11 points with eight races remaining after the ART driver finished a lowly sixth on Sunday.
In Saturday's reverse-grid 28-lap Sprint race, Doohan started and finished in 10th position, coming off second-best in a game of cat-and-mouse with Vesti that lasted for the first 20 laps and ultimately saw the Australian finish outside of the points.
In FIA Formula 3® action, Christian Mansell was the pick of the Australians over the Hungary weekend, the Campos Racing driver finishing sixth in Saturday's Sprint race and narrowly missing out on points in Sunday's Feature, fast-degrading tyres dropping him to 11th place in the closing stages.
Mansell, who came to Budapest off the back of a podium at the previous round at Silverstone as part of a run of three consecutive points finishes, qualified 10th at the Hungaroring and started the reverse-grid race from third, earning five world championship points for sixth place as he finished 8.8secs behind race-winner Gabriele Mini (Hitech).
The 18-year-old started Sunday's Feature from ninth place and held the place until there were just three laps remaining, excessive left-front tyre wear seeing him fall victim to MP Motorsport pair Jonny Edgar and Mari Boya in the closing stages as he missed the points by five seconds. Mansell sits 13th in the series standings with 34 points, 29 of which have come in a purple patch over the past five races.
Mansell's Campos Racing teammate Hugh Barter was one of the big movers in Sunday's Feature, the 17-year-old scything through the pack from 20th on the grid to finish 13th, just 1.3secs behind Mansell at the chequered flag.
It was a solid bounce-back for Barter, whose Sprint race was effectively ruined after one lap on Saturday when contact with Ido Cohen (Rodin Carlin) saw him have to make an early pit stop, and he was penalised for causing a collision on the way to a 25th-place result.
Barter is 20th in the championship standings with nine points.
The third Australian in F3® action in Hungary, Van Amersfoort Racing's Tommy Smith, finished 24th in the Sprint after being hit by Hitech's Sebastian Montoya on the first lap on Saturday and having to pit for repairs. The 21-year-old was then the last of the 29 classified runners in Sunday's Feature race as the wait for his maiden points in his rookie season continues.
F2® and F3® are both back in action at the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps next weekend (July 28-30), which is the penultimate round of the F3® season.
