Flash: Jehan Daruvala begins the F2 season with a podium
Sakhir, 27 March 2021: Red Bull Junior and ace Indian racer Jehan Daruvala began the season with a podium winning the second place in the inaugural Sprint Race at the Bahrain International Circuit at Sakhir here on Saturday.
The fifth FIA F2 season will comprise a total of eight rounds, all support events of the Formula 1 World Championship.
The 22-year-old, Jehan Daruvala started on P5 and did some consistent laps before making a move to take P3 on Lap 11. Daruvala puts pressure on Beckmann, going all the way around the outside of the Charouz driver in Turn 4 and claimed P3. Later, at the halfway mark rookie Lawson was on P1 followed by another rookie Pourchaire, who started on pole. Beckman was behind Daruvala.
By Lap 16, Daruvala was pushing Lawson and by Lap 18 the Indian closed the gap to 0.7 seconds and the rookie was fighting to mainain his P1 and the Carling driver had to be content with a P2. Even on the Lap 20, both the Red Bull drivers posted 1:59.9s battling for P1 but Liam Lawson held on to take a creditable win on his debut. The Indian who is doing another season of F2, neverthless began the season on a bright note unlike last year, where despite good qualifying results he had to battle his own car and had a terrible season. Only after the change of engine, did he find the fortunes, and he closed the season with his first F2 victory.
Following a change to the Sporting Regulations, the new season will see three races per round – the previous total was two – forming a 24-race season. There will be no changes to the Friday sessions, with one Free Practice session of 45 minutes and one Qualifying session of 30 minutes.
Two sprint races will take place on Saturday and will both consist of 120 kilometres or 45 minutes, whichever comes first.
The Feature Race will now take place on Sunday morning ahead of the Formula 1 Grand Prix. It will be still be one hour long or 170 kilometres (whichever comes first) and will keep a compulsory pit stop, in which all four tyres must be changed. Unless the driver has used wet-weather tyres during the Feature Race, they must use at least one set of each specification of dry-weather tyres during the Feature Race.
The Feature race will be on Sunday.
