Photo: Top Speed
The fight for the Formula Regional Middle East title has closed up after Freddie Slater won race one of the fourth round at Yas Marina Circuit.
ART Grand Prix’s points leader Evan Giltaire started from pole, but Mumbai Falcons’ Slater managed to jump past him before the opening corner.
Giltaire hassled the new leader through the hotel section on lap one, and stayed in his tow as he weaved down the back straight but ended lap one already being gapped. He was therefore helped by the appearance of the safety car late on lap two, following an off for Pinnacle Motorsport’s Finley Green and a collision between his team-mate Hiyu Yamakoshi and R-ace GP’s Jin Nakamura at turn one.
Racing resumed on lap four, and Slater had to weave down the back straight again to warm up his tyres. Just as he was pulling away, the safety car was summoned again on lap five due to Evans GP’s Kai Daryanani stopping at the final chicane.
The next restart was on lap eighth, and Slater built a 1.7-second gap as a fight for second took place behind. R-ace’s Ugo Ugochukwu pulled off a brilliant switchback move on Giltaire into the final chicane, completed despite running deep, and Giltaire tried coming back at him through turn one on the next lap but it instead bunched up the field behind.
Ugochukwu set successive fastest laps as he chased down Slater, and finished the 15-lap race 0.9s behind.
A distant third was Giltaire, who had held off team-mate Kanato Le. Mumbai Falcons’ Rashid Al Dhaheri was also challeing Le for much of the race, but late on became more occupied with keeping PHM Racing’s Brando Badoer behind.
R-ace’s Enzo Deligny and Pinnacle’s Ernesto Rivera were seventh and eighth, and on the final lap Sainteloc Racing’s Nikita Bedrin overtook R-ace’s Akshay Bohra for ninth.
Mercedes-AMG Formula 1 juniors Doriane Pin and Yuanpu Cui had bad races, finishing 23rd and 24th. Pin had an off, and Cui was classified a lap down after pitting.
Race results (15 laps)
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Freddie Slater | Mumbai Falcons | 30m33.054s |
| 2 | Ugo Ugochukwu | R-ace GP | +0.900s |
| 3 | Evan Giltaire | ART Grand Prix | +5.195s |
| 4 | Kanato Le | ART Grand Prix | +5.753s |
| 5 | Rashid Al Dhaheri | Mumbai Falcons | +8.648s |
| 6 | Brando Badoer | PHM Racing | +8.849s |
| 7 | Enzo Deligny | R-ace GP | +10.415s |
| 8 | Ernesto Rivera | Pinnacle Motorsport | +11.167s |
| 9 | Nikita Bedrin | Sainteloc Racing | +12.163s |
| 10 | Akshay Bohra | R-ace GP | +12.322s |
| 11 | Taito Kato | ART Grand Prix | +13.844s |
| 12 | Aditya Kulkarni | Akcel GP | +16.844s |
| 13 | Aaron Cameron | Evans GP | +17.219s |
| 14 | Ruiqi Liu | Origine Motorsport | +17.430s |
| 15 | Jack Beeton | Mumbai Falcons | +18.527s |
| 16 | Jin Nakamura | R-ace GP | +18.913s |
| 17 | James Hedley | Akcel GP | +21.101s |
| 18 | Everett Stack | PHM Racing | +21.292s |
| 19 | Hiyu Yamakoshi | Pinnacle Motorsport | +21.365s |
| 20 | Yaroslav Veselaho | Sainteloc Racing | +25.029s |
| 21 | Alex Sawer | Evans GP | +27.329s |
| 22 | Zhongwei Wang | Origine Motorsport | +29.067s |
| 23 | Doriane Pin | Mumbai Falcons | +30.715s |
| 24 | Yuanpu Cui | Pinnacle Motorsport | +1 lap |
| Ret | Kai Daryanani | Evans GP | |
| Ret | Finley Green | Pinnacle Motorsport | |
| Ret | Matteo De Palo | Evans GP | |
| Fastest lap: Ugochukwu, 1m50.456s
Championship standings |
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