Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
Formula 2 title contenders Frederik Vesti and Theo Pourchaire battled on track for the first time in 2023 in the season finale at Yas Marina Circuit.
Prema’s Vesti came out on top of the fight that began two laps after his pitstop on lap 23 of 33, where he fitted the option tyres. But ART Grand Prix’s Pourchaire claimed the larger bragging rights by becoming champion.
Vesti rose “from ninth to third, with some great battles as well, which I truly enjoyed” and said “it was a bit too close for comfort on the last lap, I’m just glad I got through it without actually crashing because it was a pretty big moment in T9”.
While his late battle with Rodin Carlin’s Zane Maloney went over the limit, the fight with Pourchaire was cleaner but close.
“I hoped not to battle too much with Theo and be ahead, but I knew I would have a lot more pace on my tyres. I came out just behind him. I spent a bit too much time fighting with Kush [Maini] and Theo, but anyway I think third was the absolute best we could do today with how the race panned out. I’m not disappointed, I’m very happy, I can go to bed tonight.”
He added: “It was a respectful fight. I knew I had to push hard. Kush was in it as well, it was a bit of a mess, but managed to get through it. Ideally quicker, yes, but in the end it didn’t change our result.”
Pourchaire finished fifth, and did not have the easiest race from 14th on the grid.
“Today’s race: very, very stressful,” he stated. “All the laps I was pushing really hard, but I didn’t want to do any mistakes. I defended really crazy on Fred, but I needed to do that to make him lose a bit of time. Overall very good drives in both races.”
Instead of covering Vesti with the same strategy, ART GP decided it was best Pourchaire do the opposite.
“It was very important to have the good strategy,” he explained. “We wanted to try the opposite as Fred, compared to Fred he was starting on the prime, so when we saw that we put the soft tyres. The soft tyres is always a safe, safe option in F2 in case there is a safety car at the beginning of the race. On the first four, five, six laps, you have high safety car risks because everyone is battling. So it was the safest option on that side.
“Victor [Martins, who finished second for ART GP] decided to go with prime-option. Victor was fighting for the teams’ championship and the rookie championship. [Vesti’s team-mate Ollie] Bearman was starting really far [back], so he didn’t have anything to lose. They tried this strategy, it worked really well. They had the virtual safety car unfortunately and couldn’t win the race because of that. We wanted also to split the cars to have maximum chances of winning the race.”