Oliver Bearman achieved his first victory of the Formula 2 season on Saturday in the Sprint race in Austria. To do so, he came out on top in a duel against Josep María Martí.
Kush Maini (Invicta Racing) started from pole position, but Bearman (Prema) took the lead right from the start while the Indian driver was also overtaken by Martí (Campos) on the second lap. By the third lap, the leader’s advantage was over two seconds.
However, the Spaniard was able to close the gap and by the start of lap 9, he was in the DRS zone. Maini remained in third, resisting Taylor Barnard (AIX Racing) until he began to lose contact and was overtaken by Paul Aron (Hitech Pulse-Eight).
The scenario did not change much, but Maini eventually lost contact with the top two by the 20th lap, and one lap later was overtaken by Aron and Gabriel Bortoleto (Invicta Racing). Bearman and Martí isolated themselves definitively in the top two positions.
The battle was reduced to the two of them, but Bearman eventually had the upper hand, extending his lead once again and finishing 1.751s ahead of Martí. Aron finished third, resisting the pressure from Bortoleto, while Dennis Hauger (MP Motorsport) completed the top five. Jak Crawford (DAMS Lucas Oil) finished sixth, while Maini could only manage seventh.
Results:
