Duerksen again wins Abu Dhabi F2 feature race from eighth

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Joshua Duerksen won the season-ending Abu Dhabi Formula 2 feature race from eighth on the grid for the second year in succession.

There was a split of strategies on the grid with Duerksen joining polesitter Roman Stanek in opting for supersoft rubber, while Jak Crawford and Leonardo Fornaroli went for softs in second and third.

Crawford however had his wheels fitted too late, and was handed a 10-second stop-go penalty before the race had even started.

Stanek retained the lead at the start with Dino Beganovic, also on supersofts, moving up to second ahead of Crawford, who pitted to serve his penalty at the end of the first lap. That promoted Duerksen up to third.

There was a virtual safety car on lap two after Alex Dunne and Victor Martins came together once more, with Cian Shields then collecting Dunne’s car. Dunne was given a 10s penalty for the incident.

The top two of Stanek and Beganovic pitted for their soft tyres at the end of lap seven and then battled for position on their out lap. That helped Duerksen to continue for another lap and then emerge from his stop almost 3s clear of Beganovic.

A further VSC after Montoya stopped a few corners after spinning off became a full-blown safety car, hurting the chances of those drivers who had started on softs and were yet to pit, led by Fornaroli and Arvid Lindblad.

Fornaroli ran wide in the final corner when the race restarted and would soon have to start defending from Lindblad, who eventually got by with around 10 laps to go. Behind, Crawford had managed to pass his nearest rival for second in the championship Richard Verschoor, and overtook Fornaroli just a couple of laps after Lindblad.

Meanwhile, Beganovic together with his Hitech team-mate Luke Browning received a five-second penalty for speeding in the pitlane as he and Stanek tried to follow Duerksen through the slower traffic.

Lindblad and Fornaroli pitted with three laps of the race remaining, with Duerksen then passing Verschoor on track to inherit the lead when Crawford pitted one lap later.

The AIX Racing driver sealed victory by 5.5s over Stanek, whose second place helped Invicta Racing clinch the teams’ title.

Beganovic’s penalty denied him a podium by just 0.2s to Gabriele Mini, who made his first visit to a feature race rostrum.

Oliver Goethe, Rafael Villagomez, Kush Maini and Ritomo Miyata followed in front of Lindblad and Crawford, who set the fastest lap on the final lap as he secured second in the standings, with champion Fornaroli completing a pointless weekend in 11th.

Race results (33 laps)