Daruvala closes on Chovet’s Asian F3 lead with victory at Yas Marina

Photo: F3 Asian Championship

Jehan Daruvala was victorious in the final race of Asian Formula 3’s back-to-back rounds at Yas Marina Circuit.

The Formula 2 race-winner took a lights-to-flag victory to half Pierre-Louis Chovet’s championship lead.

The Mumbai Falcons star led fellow F2 driver Guanyu Zhou and French Formula 4 graduate Isack Hadjar all-race long. The three were separated by less than two seconds for the entirety of the race.

Zhou attempted to pass Daruvala on the opening lap but proceedings were quickly halted when Zhou’s Abu Dhabi Racing by Prema team-mate Dino Beganovic collided with sim racer Cem Bolukbasi.

Beganovic, who will hand over his car to David Vidales for the remainder of the season, could be seen nursing his hand, while Bolukbasi’s eight-race points streak came to an end.

Daruvala mastered the safety car restart and remained unchallenged thereafter to claim his third victory of the season, while Alpine Formula 1 tester Zhou finished in second place to earn his third podium in as many rounds. Evans GP’s Hadjar earned his fifth podium of the year in third.

Pinnacle Motorsport’s Chovet was unable to match the pace of the top three and settled for fourth, just ahead of Evans GP’s Patrik Pasma – driving the chassis that was initially utilised by former team-mate Casper Stevenson – and the Hitech GP duo of Roman Stanek and Ayumu Iwasa.

Daruvala’s team-mate Kush Maini took eighth place ahead of BlackArts Racing’s Lorenzo Fluxa, who ended his strongest weekend of the season so far with two more points. Hitech’s Reece Ushijima took the final point in 10th place.

The series now heads back to Dubai Autodrome for the penultimate round on February 12-14.

Race results