Another excellent performance saw Mick Schumacher make it two wins out of two in the second of the Italian Formula 4 Qualifying Races, also ensuring he starts on pole for the final tomorrow.
A small delay to the start of the race eventually turned into the fielding getting away behind a safety car with Schumacher leading the rolling start from Job van Uitert, the fastest driver in Group C.
Not everyone started smoothly though, as the highly rated Austrian Thomas Preining stalled on the initial getaway. He eventually rolled to the end of the pit lane, spending the remainder of the race working his through the backmarkers in order to salvage a decent result, he finished sixteenth.
As the safety car eventually peeled into the pits with nineteen minutes left on the clock, van Uitert slipped back to fourth with the field unable to find grip around the soaking Misano circuit. A rumoured suspension problem put Manuel Maldonado out in the early laps as Jan-Erik Meikup beached his car in the gravel.
The top three, which included Schumacher, Diego Bertonelli and the German’s Prema Powerteam team-mate Juan Manuel Correa, broke away as the field bunched. The battle for fourth was not without casualties as a number of drivers ran into trouble.
Despite being one of the favourites, a poor qualifying from Giuliano Raucci had put him in the thick of the action, as Ye Yifei and himself touched, spinning the Chinese driver and seeing them both run through the gravel. Raucci would eventually fight his way back through the order, but could only manage twelfth.
Back at the front, with six minutes remaining van Uitert had finally gained control of his machine and was back up to fourth, looking to close down the gap to the front three. Second placed Correa dropped down to fourth in the closing stages, which allowed van Uitert to take Bertonelli around the outside for second with one minute to go.
Van Uitert continued to set fastest laps and was beginning to close on Schumacher but it proved too little too late as the Prema driver comfortably took the flag with a 3.418 second gap. Behind them Bertonelli and Correa took a rather lonely third and fourth places respectively.
Rounding out the top five was Valentin Hasse-Clot. The rookie had a troubled start to the race getting caught up in the midfield battle and running off track a number of times. Despite this, he proved to be one of the quickest drivers towards the end of the race and broke away slightly from the pack behind.
