Joey Mawson, the ADAC Formula 4 Championship leader, dominated to claim his eighth win of the season. He was delighted with his first victory at Zandvoort knowing he could wrap up the championship with one round to spare.
It was an excellent start from polesitter Mawson, as he quickly pulled away from the pack. Building up a lead of over a second and a half to Mike David Ortmann, he never looked back.
Mick Schumacher didn’t mess up his start either as he jumped Janneau Esmeijer to feed in behind the Mucke Motorsport drivers. Neither Ortmann nor Lirim Zendeli was prepared to give each other any room, but in doing so allowed Mawson to run off up the road.
The top seven soon broke away as the home driver; Esmeijer, fell back, holding up the midfield. He would eventually fall to tenth.
Typically with an ADAC F4 race, a safety car was called after a driver was trapped in the gravel. Sophia Floersch had been running in fourteenth, but spun after contact. She attempted to recover by driving through the gravel trap, but was caught, ending her race.
Mawson remained unchallenged for much of the competition, dominating out front. Other than the closing up during the safety car, he kept his cool to claim his eighth victory of the year.
Behind him Ortmann took second ahead of the driver he’d beaten to last year’s rookie title; Schumacher. The Prema Powerteam driver had made the most of the restart, leapfrogging Zendeli after he locked up on cold brakes.
Fortunately for Zendeli, he held on to fourth despite late pressure from Juri Vips. The Estonian had made a good start though was a second behind Schumacher in the first half of the race. He finally warmed up towards the end and lead home fellow rookie and teammate Juan Manuel Correa.
As the race drew to an end, the battle for seventh heated up with Jonathan Aberdein holding up Kami Laliberte. The Canadian had made a poor start and was determined to make up ground. Aberdein eventually broke away with Felipe Drugovich and Esmeijer completing the top ten. While it had been a disastrous race for Esmeijer, he’ll take some comfort in his race three pole.
Elsewhere, Simo Laaksonen, who had been caught up in the Floersch incident, retired. He was joined on the sidelines by Devlin DeFrancesco who ended his first ADAC F4 race in disappointment.
