Crawford beats Dunne to win wet Silverstone F2 feature race

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Jak Crawford won a thrilling Formula 2 feature race at a wet Silverstone ahead of Alex Dunne and charging home hero Luke Browning.

With the entire field starting the race on wet tyres, polesitter Victor Martins struggled to get away as the lights went out and got swallowed by the fast-starting Crawford, who shot into the lead from third on the grid. By the end of lap one the American had pulled a one second gap over Dunne in second.

Having started 12th, Browning was on a charge in conditions he enjoys. Having made up four places at the start, the Hitech driver then passed Arvid Lindblad for eighth with teammate Dino Beganovic following behind.

The Williams junior next pulled off a spectacular move on championship leader Richard Verschoor, switching from the outside to the inside line at Copse corner to move into seventh.

With DRS enabled, Browning’s pace increased and by lap 18 he had passed Martins for third, having dispatched Joshua Duerksen two laps previously.

With the track only slowly drying out and wet tyres beginning to overheat, drivers started to make their mandatory pitstops, for a mix of slick and fresh wet tyres. Lindblad was one of the first to jump on lap 21 and, on fresh wet tyres, was flying, lapping just under 2 seconds quicker than the rest of the field.

Gabriele Mini meanwhile gambled on slick tyres and made contact with Oliver Goethe as he struggled to turn into turn 3. The Prema driver continued but pulled off to the side of the track at Luffield, triggering a virtual safety car.

Under increasing pressure from Dunne, Crawford dived towards the pits just before the VSC was deployed and returned to the track in fifth, while Dunne opted to stay out. Browning had already made his stop under green flag conditions.

The full safety car was required though when Roman Stanek, who had earlier been running in the points, stopped on the exit of Becketts having spun on slicks.

This gave Dunne the chance to pit and emerge back behind Crawford and in front of Browning, having felt he had been held up by slick-shod teammate Amaury Cordeel during the VSC.

With two laps left, the safety car pulled in and Crawford led the field away. But behind, Duerksen spun through the final corner and stalled, triggering another safety car.

That meant Crawford was free to claim his third win of the season, putting him within six points of Verschoor at the top of the championship.

Race results (29 laps)