Inthraphuvasak lands second FIA F3 win in Hungaroring sprint race

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Campos Racing’s Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak won FIA Formula 3’s sprint race at the Hungaroring from reversed-grid pole.

Before the start, Rodin Motorsport’s Callum Voisin and DAMS’ Christian Ho were handed three-place grid penalties for both of this weekend’s races for impeding in qualifying. However, with both having qualified far from the top 10, it was of little impact.

Inthraphuvasak had AIX Racing’s James Hedley alongside him at the front, with ART Grand Prix’s James Wharton, MP Motorsport’s Alessandro Giusti, Prema’s Ugo Ugochukwu and Trident’s Charlie Wurz next up.

It was Ugochukwu who initially looked to have the most productive lap one as he cleared Giusti, but when his front-left wheel made contact with Ugochukwu’s rear-right exiting turn 12 it immediately broke Giusti’s suspension and sent him spearing off into the barriers at turn 13.

That meant Ugochukwu ended up behind team-mate Brando Badoer and Wurz in sixth. The safety car was then  summoned to clear Giusti’s car as well as debris from another collision involving ART GP’s Laurens van Hoepen and Van Amersfoort Racing’s Ivan Domingues, which led to both pitting.

Racing resumed on lap four, and Ugochukwu made quick work of Wurz. He set the fastest lap as he then passed Badoer, and with a pace advantage was able to set another fastest lap after clearing Wharton.

Once he had made his way to the rear of Hedley, he wasted little time in overtaking him on lap 11. That brief battle allowed Inthraphuvasak to grow his lead back up to 1.2 seconds, having earlier been only 0.5s, and he initially maintained that gap.

Ugochukwu was starting to reduce it again just as the safety car returned on lap 14, due to VAR’s Theophile Nael and Prema’s Noel Leon colliding at the exit of turn four while battling over eighth. Leon, who started 13th, had been on a charge.

Wurz was busy either side of the safety car period, overtaking Wharton and Hedley. Since the restart was on the final lap, he only had two chances to nail a pass and he got it done and followed home Ugochukwu in third for the second sprint race in a row.

Inthraphuvasak met the chequered flag with an advantage of 0.82s for his second win in the last three sprint races, while the championship’s usual frontrunners had a less productive time.

Only three drivers in the top 10 in the standings scored, with Campos’s Mari Boya the highest placed of those in seventh. Trident’s points leader Rafael Camara just about kept himself out of drama to finish eighth. Unlike Leon, Nael was able to continue after the contact driving under the chequered flag in ninth.

Camara’s closest title rival Nikola Tsolov recovered from 21st on the grid to 15th, and MP Motorsport’s Tim Tramnitz rose from 17th to 13th after Hitech GP’s title outsider Martinius Stenshorne had a five-second penalty for gaining an advantage off-track that dropped him from 12th to 23rd.

Race results (19 laps)