Home Formula 4Italian F4 Iron Lynx and Leonardo Fornaroli lock in their first Italian F4 win

Iron Lynx and Leonardo Fornaroli lock in their first Italian F4 win

by Craig Woollard

Photo: ACI Sport

Leonardo Fornaroli won the first Italian Formula 4 race of the weekend at Misano, while Prema’s Hamda Al Qubaisi took a historic podium.

Carrying over a penalty from the previous round at Paul Ricard, top qualifier Kirill Smal lost pole to Iron Lynx driver Fornaroli, with Van Amersfoort Racing’s Ollie Bearman also being promoted to the front row.

Fornaroli made a good start, while second and third-placed starters Sebastian Montoya and Smal made terrible getaways.

Bearman was the aggressor on Fornaroli, keeping within a second of the leader for much of the 30-minute race. Fornaroli locked up a number of times but was able to keep in front.

He dropped back further on, allowing Fornaroli to secure his first victory in Italian F4, and his first podium of the season.

Al Qubaisi rounded out the podium, the first woman to do so in Italian F4, after sustaining race-long pressure from VAR’s Nikita Bedrin and later Mucke Motorsport’s Jonas Ried.

Ried overtook Bedrin late on to take fourth, while Prema’s Montoya recovered to sixth after dropping to 13th. The Colombian pulled a fine double move on R-ace GP duo Victor Bernier and Sami Meguetounif.

Smal was right behind Montoya for much of the race, until he came up to pass VAR’s Benice Valint when they were battling over seventh with just a few laps to go. The two made contact late in the race, taking the latter out and dropping Smal down the order.

Despite the car being in a slightly precarious position, the race was continued without a safety car until the end.

Bernier, Meguetounif, Smal and Leonardo Bizzotto provisionally round out the top 10.

Race results
Pos Driver Team Time
1 Leonardo Fornaroli Iron Lynx 20 laps
2 Ollie Bearman Van Amersfoort Racing +1.795s
3 Hamda Al Qubaisi Prema +9.045s
4 Jonas Ried Mucke Motorsport +9.506s
5 Nikita Bedrin Van Amersfoort Racing +10.426s
6 Sebastian Montoya Prema +13.891s
7 Victor Bernier R-ace GP +17.864s
8 Sami Meguetounif R-ace GP +18.807s
9 Kirill Smal Prema +19.306s
10 Leonardo Bizzotto BVM Racing +24.638s
11 Lorenzo Patrese AKM Motorsport +24.957s
12 Samir Ben Jenzer Motorsport +25.274s
13 Maya Weug Iron Lynx +25.646s
14 Cenyu Han Van Amersfoort Racing +26.546s
15 Piotr Wisnicki Jenzer Motorsport +29.790s
16 Joshua Duerksen Mucke Motorsport +29.873s
17 Erick Zuniga Mucke Motorsport +30.148s
18 Francesco Braschi Jenzer Motorsport +30.572s
19 Conrad Laursen Van Amersfoort Racing +31.200s
20 Nicolas Baptiste Cram Motorsport +32.893s
21 Levente Revesz AKM Motorsport +33.438s
22 Marcus Amand R-ace GP +34.254s
23 Kacper Sztuka AS Motorsport +36.298s
24 Eron Rexhepi BVM Racing +36.992s
25 Jorge Garciarce Jenzer Motorsport +37.861s
26 Pietro Armanni Iron Lynx +44.874s
27 Pedro Perino DR Formula +47.463s
Ret Joshua Dufek Van Amersfoort Racing
Ret Bence Valint Van Amersfoort Racing
Fastest lap: Ried, 1m34.452s

Championship standings
1 Tim Tramnitz 68   2 Bearman 57   3 Fornaroli 47   4 Smal 42   5 Vlad Lomko 33   6 Montoya 30  7 Luke Browning 27   8 Duerksen 18   9 Bernier 18   10 Al Qubaisi 15