This page contains archived information and may not display perfectly

F2 - All you need to know about the tenth round of the season

  • gb
05.10.17

F2 - 2017 Race of Jerez - Preview

2017 Round 10 preview: Circuito de Jerez, Spain   

 

All you need to know about the tenth round of the season

 

Data (GMT+2)

Friday

Free Practice: 11.00 – 11.45

Qualifying session: 15:30 - 16:00

Press conference: 16.30

Saturday

Feature race: 14.00 (39 laps)
Press conference: 15.20

Sunday
Sprint race: 14.00 (28 laps)
Press conference: 15.05

 

Season Stats
12 
Points Oliver Rowland must outscore Charles Leclerc by to keep championship open to Abu Dhabi  

9 Points between Rowland (P2) and Luca Ghiotto (P4)   

Teams with both drivers in Top 5 (DAMS and RUSSIAN TIME)   

11 Points between RUSSIAN TIME (P1) and PREMA Racing (P3)  

 

Warm Up // Alexander Albon – ART Grand Prix     

“It’s a cool track – I did it in Formula Renault 2.0, and I really enjoyed it. The main thing there is tyre degradation – that’s a big one, and I think with the Pirellis this year we’ll struggle, but that will make for good racing! Overtaking is quite hard in Jerez, although there are corners where it’s a high speed corner before it so it’s hard to stay close, but if we do get the high deg we’re all expecting. I know Nobu tested there in 2016 with this car.

 

“It’s a really flowing circuit, a bit like Hungary, and the corners lead onto other corners so it’s all about getting a good rhythm, and not getting out of sequence with them. It’s going to be a really cool track in the sense that all the other tracks, because they’re designed for F1, they have run offs everywhere, but in Jerez there is grass on the exits, gravel on the exits, walls on every side – that gives it another element, and means you need balls!”

 

The Stakes        
The penultimate round of the 2017 FIA Formula 2 Championship will be held this weekend at the Circuito de Jerez, Spain for the only standalone race weekend on the calendar. The circuit is well known to many of the teams and drivers as a popular test circuit, and they will be looking forward to making the step up into the position generally filled by Formula 1 in the schedule on a circuit that will provide a strong test for both the engineers and the drivers.

 

Last time out in Monza the usual form book was thrown out the window: after the successful launch of next year’s car, the F2 2018, the teams got to work on track, with RUSSIAN TIME leading the way in free practice before Nobuharu Matsushita claimed the honours in qualifying ahead of Nyck De Vries, the first time this year the session wasn’t topped by championship leader Charles Leclerc. But on Saturday major storms delayed the start of the feature race: De Vries took the lead at the start, holding Leclerc at bay until Oliver Rowland lost a wheel after his stop, prompting a safety car period. A 3 way fight between De Vries, Leclerc and Ghiotto in the closing laps saw the first 2 collide and the Italian claim the win only to pick up a 5s time penalty for cutting the chicane, handing the win to countryman Antonio Fuoco from Matsushita and Nicholas Latifi.

 

Ghiotto reclaimed the top step of the podium on Sunday, however, with an emotional victory built by a formidable drive in the sprint race: the Italian sliced his way past four rivals on the way to P1 while Sergio Sette Camara repeated his strong Sunday form but was unable to contain Ghiotto, making do with holding off Fuoco for P2. With championship rivals Leclerc and Rowland failing to pick up any points over the weekend for the first time this season, RUSSIAN TIME teammates Artem Markelov and Ghiotto have closed up in the standings with 2 weekends remaining.

 

Mario Isola, Head of Car Racing at Pirelli:

“After having been completely re-asphalted recently, the surface characteristics have changed, resulting in much smoother asphalt and fewer bumps, according to our engineers who have assessed the new asphalt. Jerez is a venue that we know well from Formula 1 testing, and it's a track with a wide variety of quite technical corners that can challenge every aspect of driver and car performance: one of the reasons why it was originally chosen for testing purposes.” 

Noteworthy

·       There are 2 driver changes for Jerez: Rene Binder will race for Rapax in car #19, replacing Roberto Merhi, and Alex Palou will also make his F2 debut, joining his countrymen at Campos Racing in car #12, replacing Robert Visoiu.

·       Antonio Fuoco is the only driver to win a race (Monza feature) without ever leading a lap in Formula 2.

·       DAMS have achieved the most podium finishes (15), ahead of RUSSIAN TIME (11) and PREMA Racing (10).

·       Monza saw the top 3 in the teams’ championship shake up: RUSSIAN TIME now leads DAMS by just 7 points, with PREMA Racing 4 points further back.

·       RUSSIAN TIME are the only team to have scored points in every single race this season.

·       Leclerc and Rowland both failed to finish in the points in Monza, for the first time this season.

·       Luca Ghiotto is the most consistent point scorer in the championship, failing to score points in just two races. Teammate Artem Markelov is the next most consistent, missing out in four races.

 

Most Improved

Sean Gelael (Pertamina Arden) +5 Places between Round 8 (Spa-Francorchamps) and Round 9 (Monza).