Home Formula 4ADAC F4 Bearman wins again at Zandvoort after safety car restart crash

Bearman wins again at Zandvoort after safety car restart crash

by Bethonie Waring

Photo: ADAC

Ollie Bearman led a Van Amersfoort Racing 1-2-3 in a safety car-disrupted second ADAC Formula 4 race at Zandvoort.

Bearman led from start to finish and had little challenge from team-mate Joshua Dufek in second.

Three safety cars disrupted running at Zandvoort, with the third coming after an incident on the second restart. There was no time to resume racing after the final incident was cleared and the race ended under yellow flag conditions.

Bearman got a good start from pole, with Dufek holding off Kirill Smal to retain second place. The top three pulled away from the rest of the field and were enjoying a quiet race until contact between Jorge Garciarce and Maya Weug left the latter stranded at the side of the track.

The first safety car of the day bunched up the field, but Bearman managed the safety car restart perfectly and had already gapped Dufek by the time they had exited turn one.

Further back, the battling Nikita Bedrin and Victor Bernier were catching Smal in third. Smal couldn’t hold off the pair and slipped back to fifth shortly before an incident for Francesco Braschi brought out the safety car again.

Braschi, running towards the back of the field, ran wide and managed to go airbourne, leaving him with damaged suspension.

On the restart, Bearman bunched the field up, waiting until the last possible moment before getting the race back underway. This caused a concertina effect further back and Taylor Bernard and Marcus Amand collided.

The safety car was brought out again and the race would not resume, with Bearman taking another win.

Further back, Sebastian Montoya spent the race recovering from a wide moment on the opening lap that dropped him back to sixth. He fell behind Tim Tramnitz and followed the US Racing driver during his climb up through the order.

Sami Meguetounif managed to jump up past Montoya on the final restart – one of the few drivers to make up positions during the brief green flag period – and the three finished sixth through eighth.

After a strong start to the race, Luke Browning dropped back to ninth ahead of Vlad Lomko.

Race results
Pos Driver Team Time
1 Ollie Bearman Van Amersfoort Racing 16 laps
2 Joshua Dufek Van Amersfoort Racing +0.371s
3 Nikita Bedrin Van Amersfoort Racing +0.789s
4 Victor Bernier R-ace GP +1.215s
5 Kirill Smal Prema +2.267s
6 Tim Tramnitz US Racing +2.937s
7 Sami Meguetounif R-ace GP +3.831s
8 Sebastian Montoya Prema +4.238s
9 Luke Browning US Racing +4.413s
10 Vlad Lomko US Racing +4.838s
11 Bence Valint Van Amersfoort Racing +5.249s
12 Hamda Al Qubaisi Prema Powerteam +5.602s
13 Leonardo Fornaroli Iron Lynx +5.865s
14 Valentino Catalano BWR Motorsport +6.386s
15 Conrad Laursen Prema Powerteam +6.704s
16 Cenyu Han Van Amersfoort Racing +7.115s
17 Levente Revesz R-ace GP +7.797s
18 Jorge Gariarce Jenzer Motorsport +8.392s
19 Michael Sauter Sauter Engineering+Design +48.995s
Ret Marcus Amand R-ace GP
Ret Taylor Barnard BWR Motorsports
Ret Francesco Braschi Jenzer Motorsport
Ret Maya Weug Iron Lynx
Fastest lap: Bearman, 1m36.092s

Championship standings
1
Bearman 100   2 Browning 59   3 Montoya 54   4 Tramnitz 54   5 Smal 45   6 Dufek 38   7 Bernier 38   8 Bedrin 33   9 Han 24   10 Meguetounif 14