Goethe on top as drivers rack up the laps in F2 test’s second afternoon

Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

MP Motorsport’s Oliver Goethe led the way on the second afternoon of Formula 2’s pre-season Barcelona test.

The firsy flying lap of the session came seven minutes, which was a 1m24.372s from Goethe. Nobody would beat it.

At that point he led team-mate Richard Verschoor by 0.13 seconds, and Trident’s Max Esterson was 0.879s behind in third. A further 0.07s slower was Esterson’s team-mate Sami Meguetounif.

Hitech GP’s Dino Beganovic was fifth, and there was competition for sixth thereon. ART Grand Prix’s Ritomo Miyata initially held the position on the timesheet, then Van Amersfoort Racing’s John Bennett and his team-mate Rafael Villagomez. In the first half-hour, Villagomez and Bennett improved multiple times but did not move up the order.

Beganovic set a 1m26.101s to climb one spot to fourth 28 minutes in, and 11 minutes later Meguetounif got within 0.759s of Goethe’s pace to move into third. At the same time, Invicta Racing’s Roman Stanek went seventh fastest.

Villagomez set another new personal best but remained in sixth after three quarters of an hour, as Beganovic lapped just 0.052s off the benchmark time, and a third of the way through the three-hour session Stanek set a 1m25.758s to snatch sixth.

That position was reclaimed by Villagomez approaching the afternoon’s halfway mark as he improved to 1m25.259s, and Invicta’s Leonardo Fornaroli went eighth fastest with a 1m27.165s lap late in his first timed run. Prema’s Sebastian Montoya and Gabriele Mini got themselves into 10th and 11th as they began a run, with ART Grand Prix’s drivers also heading out.

A few laps later, ART GP’s Victor Martins set a 1m29.178s to climb to 10th, going 0.006s faster than Rodin Motorsport’s Christian Mansell who had also improved. Martins was down to 13th two minutes on from that, as Montoya set a 1m28.701s, Mini improved to 1m28.905s and ART GP’s Ritomo Miyata also broke into the 1m28s.

With 73 minutes remaining, Villagomez finally gained positions with a 1m24.949s lap that put him fourth. Stanek then put him back down a spot by setting a 1m24.655s, and Fornaroli improved but remained eighth.

Bennett made a small pace gain in ninth as the session entered its final hour, then red flags waved as a track clear-up took place. At this point, Hitech’s Luke Browning had still not set a lap.

Fornaroli and Bennett swapped places 20 minutes later as the latter improved to 1m26.149s, and with 33 minutes to go AIX Racing’s Cian Shields jumped from 21st to 11th but was 3.925s off the pace.

Going into the final half-hour, Fornaroli moved back ahead of Bennett by 0.644s and Browning’s first flying lap put him into 11th.

Rodin sent its drivers out on a fresh tyre run that lifted Mansell and Alex Dunne to ninth and 10th, both going around 1.7s slower than Goethe, then Meguetounif caused red flags by stopping on the pit straight.

AIX best utilised the time after the restart as both of its drivers improved, and nobody else did.

Afternoon session results