Kfzteile24 Mücke Motorsport’s Felix Rosenqvist won again on race 2 of the weekend at the Red Bull Ring, which was red-flagged after a collision between Prema Powerteam’s Alex Lynn and Fortec Motorsports’ Luis Felipe Derani on lap 19 forced an early stoppage, thereby meaning points leader Raffaele Marciello would finish in 13th place, losing more of his clear advantage to his Swedish rival.
Carlin driver and Red Bull protégé, Russia’s Daniil Kvyat and URD Rennsport’s Lucas Wolf secured the final places on the podium for the second race, with the German driver securing his first podium finish in the championship this season, Wolf had taken an early lead, but Rosenqvist and Kvyat saw otherwise soon after, overtaking the young driver, who ended up fighting with Nicholas Latifi, before ma-con’s Sven Muller got under the Canadian’s skin on track.
However, Muller’s crashing antics continued this time around, as both he and Latifi collided on lap 7, retiring as a result, which promoted hometown hero Lucas Auer into P4. The Austrian driver had a deficit of six seconds to Wolf, but Auer was unable to close the gap before the red flag incident occurred.
Fortec’s Josh Hill recorded another welcome top 5 five finish to help his consistency this season, with Jordan King, Harry Tincknell and Tom Blomqvist making it 4 Brits in the top ten, with Eddie Cheever and Michael Lewis rounding out the points finishers. Double R Racing’s Tatiana Calderon is pushing hard as always, having finished in 21st, ahead of teammate and 2012 Formula Pilota China champion Antonio Giovinazzi, showing that she can mix it up with the best of them, but progress is still yet to come from the 19-year-old Colombian female racer.
Because of Lynn and Derani’s accident, Lynn’s Dallara was stranded in the centre of the track, after hitting the tyre barrier, with debris being spread across the track after a nasty accident for the British driver. Rosenqvist secured his second win of the weekend, which was clearly ultra-dominant because of the Swedish driver setting fast laps and clearing a gap between himself and Kvyat: “The race was slightly more difficult than the first one, because I only started from third place on the grid. But I was able to overtake Daniil and Lucas in the opening lap already. After that, it was more or less like the race this morning. Towards the end, I didn’t take any risks anymore and I tried to safely drive victory home.”
The young driver Wolf was ecstatic to get his first podium for the URD team in Spielberg, and hopes to have another turn of good form as the season progresses: “I am very happy with my maiden podium finish in the FIA Formula 3 European Championship. I don’t have any teammates and therefore, it isn’t always easy for us. But we try to make the best out of our possibilities and I hope that I can add further podium finishes to this one.”
So before the 6 week break before returning to action at the Norisring, the drivers would have just one more race in the beautiful Styrian countryside before gathering their thoughts and taking some time to recharge those every important batteries, as we would find out just who would be points leader before the end of the first part of the season…
