Photo: Fotospeedy
Brad Benavides, Francesco Simonazzi and Michael Shin were the Euroformula race-winners in round two at Hockenheim.
Benavides set a 1m31.134s to take pole for race one by 0.657 seconds over Motopark team-mate Levente Revesz, with Jakob Bergmeister, Simonazzi, the debuting ex-FIA Formula 3 racer Shin and Paolo Brajnik completing the top six. Fernando Barrichello had his six best laps deleted so ended up 5.661s off the pace in seventh and last.
Shin failed to get going at the start, Brajnik pulled to the side (then got wheeled off the grid) and Benavides lurched off the line so dropped to third behind Revesz and Simonazzi.
BVM Racing driver Simonazzi had a go at Revesz at turn two, but then was attacked by Benavides at turn seven and lap one finished with 1.46s covering the trio. Benavides tried going around the outside of Simonazzi at the turn six hairpin on lap two, then on the inside on lap three and that time he got it done.
A flurry of fastest laps soon brought him onto the rear of Revesz, and on lap nine of 18 he took the inside line at the turn seven right-hander and got into the lead just as Simonazzi had started closing back in on him. Once up front, Benavides quickly established a 1.5s gap and that grew considerably in the last laps as Simonazzi finally attempted to pass Revesz after shadowing him for a long time.
On the penultimate lap they went side-by-side en route to turn six, and at the same corner a lap later he took the outside line and it did not work. But Revesz then had a brief wobble and Simonazzi snuck through. However with 10s of track limits penalties hanging over him, Simonazzi ended up finishing sixth and Benavides won by 6.088s over Revesz. Bergmeister was only a further 0.543s behind, and Shin was fourth despite his own two-second track limits penalty.
Simonazzi’s finishing position put him on reversed-grid pole for race two, which he led lights-to-flag for his fifth Euroformula win. Bergmeister was his closest rival for the first three laps, then Benavides passed him at the hairpin and sat in Simonazzi’s mirrors for the remaining 14 laps.
Bergmeister finished 5.754s behind in third, Revesz was a distant 14.602s back in fourth and Shin beat Barrichello to fifth after both got penalties while battling.
Shin won from reversed-grid pole in race three, which Brajnik missed. Simonazzi tried passing Shin at turn six on laps one, two and five, with his third attempt getting him ahead until he ran wide at the corner exit and dropped back behind. He made further attempts on laps six and nine before Shin edged away.
Revesz got into third at the start, with Benavides passing him at the hairpin before losing out at turn eight. On lap five they swapped places, with Revesz going off at turn eight, then did again on lap 11. Bergmeister demoted Benavides to fifth a lap later and briefly pressured Revesz.
Results round-up
Race 1 (18 laps)
1 Brad Benavides Motopark 28m17.579s
2 Levente Revesz Motopark +6.088s
3 Jakob Bergmeister Motopark +6.631s
4 Michael Shin Motopark +13.444s
5 Fernando Barrichello Motopark +13.651s
6 Francesco Simonazzi BVM Racing +15.012s
Ret Paolo Brajnik NV Racing
Pole: Benavides, 1m31.134s
Fastest lap: Benavides, 1m33.186s
Race 2 (18 laps)
1 Simonazzi 28m16.846s
2 Benavides +1.481s
3 Bergmeister +5.754s
4 Revesz +14.602s
5 Shin +18.455s
6 Barrichello +22.821s
7 Brajnik +1m00.845s
FL: Benavides, 1m33.578s
Race 3 (18 laps)
1 Shin 28m11.278s
2 Simonazzi +1.763s
3 Revesz +10.894s
4 Bergmeister +13.625s
5 Benavides +20.396s
6 Barrichello +43.160s
FL: Shin, 1m33.081s
Championship standings
1 Benavides 124 2 Simonazzi 109 3 Revesz 72 4 Bergmeister 72 5 Lorenzo Fluxa 59 6 Barrichello 56 7 Shin 48 8 Brajnik 6