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Doohan wins wet second FIA F3 race at Spa

by Alejandro Alonso Lopez

Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited

Jack Doohan claimed a lights-to-flag win in the FIA Formula 3 Championship’s second race of the weekend at Spa-Francorchamps.

The Australian driver survived a safety car restart to take his second victory ahead of David Schumacher in second and Logan Sargeant in third.

It was another race with changing conditions at Spa which started one hour later than scheduled, but unlike in this morning’s race, this time the delay was caused by a red flag during the Formula 1 qualifying which altered the timetable for the rest of the day.

Despite the track being wet, the safety car wasn’t needed at the start as the sun was shining and the track was drying.

Trident driver Doohan led the way after lap one ahead of his team mate Schumacher, who also held on to his grid position.

Things weren’t that calm behind Trident’s duo. A great start by Charouz’s Sargeant provided a three-wide moment going into La Source, which ended with ART Grand Prix’s Alex Smolyar running wide and dropping five places.

In the middle of the field, Prema’s team mates Arthur Leclerc and Dennis Hauger gained some places to introduce themselves into the top 10. In the process, Leclerc made contact with Jonathan Hoggard while trying to pass him around the outside at Pouhon.

The Monegasque driver was able to continue without losing positions, but the Jenzer Motorsport ace wasn’t that lucky and spun round, dropping to the back of the pack.

The virtual safety car was deployed on lap 10 to recover Matteo Nannini’s car, who stalled after spinning around in the last corner. Difficulties moving the HWA forced race direction to deploy the safety car, as the rain began to come down again.

The race was restarted with four laps to go, but the green flag didn’t last long.

Amaury Cordeel hit the barriers at the top of Raidillon and was collected by Calan Williams, bringing out the safety car again and with it the end of the race.

The points positions were completed by Caio Collet in fourth, Clement Novalak in fifth, Frederik Vesti in sixth, Victor Martins in seventh, Smolyar in eighth, Hauger in ninth and Leclerc in 10th.

Race one winner Lorenzo Colombo wasn’t able to replicate this morning’s performance, and finished down in 14th place after losing several places in the opening lap.

Race results (16 laps)
Pos Driver Team Time
1 Jack Doohan Trident 45m11.332
2 David Schumacher Trident 0.488
3 Logan Sargeant Charouz Racing System 1.093
4 Caio Collet MP Motorsport 1.965
5 Clement Novalak Trident 2.780
6 Frederik Vesti ART Grand Prix 3.049
7 Victor Martins MP Motorsport 3.580
8 Alexander Smolyar ART Grand Prix 4.330
9 Dennis Hauger Prema 4.946
10 Arthur Leclerc Prema 6.459
11 Ayumu Iwasa Hitech GP 7.194
12 Jak Crawford Hitech GP 7.546
13 Roman Stanek Hitech GP 8.988
14 Lorenzo Colombo Campos Racing 9.690
15 Olli Caldwell Prema 10.756
16 Tijmen van der Helm MP Motorsport 11.488
17 Jonny Edgar Carlin 12.457
18 Juan Manuel Correa ART Grand Prix 13.638
19 Filip Ugran Jenzer Motorsport 14.086
20 Ido Cohen Carlin 14.956
21 Oliver Rasmussen HWA Racelab 15.881
22 Laszlo Toth Campos Racing 16.286
23 Zdenek Chovanec Charouz Racing System 17.045
24 Rafael Villagomez HWA Racelab 17.404
25 Hunter Yeany Charouz Racing System 19.666
26 Johnathan Hoggard Jenzer Motorsport 23.279
Ret Amaury Cordeel Campos Racing
Ret Calan Williams Jenzer Motorsport
Ret Matteo Nannini HWA Racelab
Fastest lap: Novalak, 2m24.940s

Championship standings
Hauger 154   2 Doohan 108   3 Vesti 93   4 Caldwell 86   5 Novalak 82   6 Smolyar 77   7 Martins 76   8 Collet 51   9 Sargeant 48   10 Schumacher 47