Home Featured Antonelli completes triple win, Camara charges from 34th to podium

Antonelli completes triple win, Camara charges from 34th to podium

by Ida Wood

Photo: ACI Sport

Andrea Kimi Antonelli completed an unbeaten weekend at Spa-Francorchamps by winning the third Italian Formula 4 race at the track.

Antonelli won from pole in the first two races, and started second for race three courtesy of the grid being set by each driver’s second-best qualifying laps.

Second became first instantly though as poleman and Prema team-mate Rafael Camara stalled and dropped to 34th while the other two Prema cars of Conrad Laursen and James Wharton disputed second.

Antonelli didn’t have enough time to break the slipstream as the safety car was called out mid-lap after Wharton was hit out at Les Combes by PHM Racing’s Nikita Bedrin who had attempted to go around his outside at Les Combes to take second place but turned in so late that he then jolted across into Wharton.

On the restart Antonelli did break the tow, and he spent the remainder of the race minding his own business as he took his fifth win in six races and a perfect weekend triple.

Laursen had a similarly easy job in second place while Bedrin initially ran ahead of Wurz (another Prema driver) and the US Racing trio of Marcus Amand, Nikhil Bohra and Alex Dunne until he was given a drive-through penalty for his Wharton clash.

Amand did get ahead of Wurz, but he reclaimed the position later in the race. His pass on Amand put him into the clutches of not only Dunne but also latterly PHM’s Taylor Barnard and the recovering Camara who had climbed to 19th by lap five, 10th by lap eight and then seventh on lap 10 as he dived down the inside of US’s Kacper Sztuka into La Source.

Dunne and Amand went side-by-side into Les Combes on that lap and although they kept it clean it meant Barnard could get alongside them. He than ran into the gravel and Camara and Sztuka got through, then Camara cleared the US pair nex time by.

With two laps remaining Camara was only half a second behind Wurz, and he passed the Austrian down the inside of Les Combes to remarkably make it onto the podium.

Wurz resisted Dunne’s attacks on the final lap for fifth, with Sztuka bearing Mand to seventh.

Barnard was demoted to ninth on the last lap by Van Amersfoort Racing’s Martinius Stenshorne at Les Combes, and Bohra scored the final point in 10th.

L5 goes off deukmedjian domingues and weug collide final corner

Race result (13 laps)
Pos Driver Team Time
1 Andrea Kimi Antonelli Prema 33m06.316s
2 Conrad Laursen Prema +7.467s
3 Rafael Camara Prema +8.778s
4 Charlie Wurz Prema +11.019s
5 Alex Dunne US Racing +11.166s
6 Kacper Sztuka US Racing +12.858s
7 Marcus Amand US Racing +14.230s
8 Martinius Stenshorne Van Amersfoort Racing +14.828s
9 Taylor Barnard PHM Racing +14.990s
10 Nikhil Bohra US Racing +19.733s
11 Brando Badoer Van Amersfoort Racing +20.031s
12 Ivan Domingues Iron Lynx +21.205s
13 Emmo Fittipaldi Van Amersfoort Racing +21.495s
14 Alfio Spina BWR Motorsports +22.656s
15 Maya Weug Iron Lynx +22.659s
16 Pedro Perino US Racing +26.519s
17 Nikita Bedrin PHM Racing +30.753s
18 William Karlsson BVM Racing +31.570s
19 Valentin Kluss Jenzer Motorsport +35.164s
20 Alex Partyshev Jenzer Motorsport +36.922s
21 Ethan Ischer Jenzer Motorsport +37.324s
22 Ricardo Escotto Cram Motorsport +37.591s
23 Valerio Rinicella AKM Motorsport +42.460s
24 Jules Castro Van Amersfoort Racing +43.179s
25 Viktoria Blokhina PHM Racing +43.289s
26 Nadhavud Bhirombhakdi Jenzer Motorsport +45.323s
27 Kim Hwarang BVM Racing +45.542s
28 Elia Sperandio Maffi Racing +46.172s
29 Rishab Jain BWR Motorsports +51.649s
30 Georgios Markogiannis Cram Motorsport +52.355s
31 Nicholas Monteiro Cram Motorsport +59.549s
32 Ismoilkhuja Akhmedkhodjaev AKM Motorsport +59.911s
33 Jonas Ried PHM Racing +1m18.236s
Ret Arias Deukmedjian Van Amersfoort Racing
Ret Frederik Lund R-ace GP
Ret James Wharton Prema
Fastest lap: Camara, 2m22.522s

Championship standings
1
Camara 147   2 Antonelli 144   3 Dunne 108   4 Wharton 79   5 Wurz 72   6 Amand 67   7 Sztuka 64   8 Bedrin 52   9 Stenshorne 48   10 Laursen 48