Liam Lawson wins the last race of the season as Oscar Piastri edges Theo Pourchaire in thrilling decider

Credit: F3

Liam Lawson dominated the final race of the Formula 3 season – as Oscar Piastri edged a valiant Theo Pourchaire to take the championship.

The Hitech driver dominated the race to take the win at Mugello – but the real story was between Pourchaire and Piastri.

The ART driver attacked throughout the race to charge to the podium – failing to overtake the Trident of David Beckmann for what would have been the championship.

Meanwhile, Piastri limped home to seventh but did just enough to take the title by a slender margin of two points.

Logan Sargeant was involved in a collision on the opening lap to take the title-favourite out of contention.

Enzo Fittipaldi has his best result of the season with fourth – just ahead of Richard Verschoor – with Jake Hughes rounding out the top six.

Piastri was seventh and champion – ahead of Sebastian Fernandez

Frederik Vesti and Alex Smolyar rounded out the top ten.

Story of the race

Lawson initially started well – but Sebastian Fernandez got into the slipstream and attempted to challenge the polesitter round the outside.

The Hitech driver then squeezed the Spaniard out of the road to defend the lead and leave Fernandez fourth.

As Fernandez rejoined the circuit it caused a concertina effect – leaving a three-wide moment between himself, Lirim Zendeli, and championship-chasing Sargeant.

The American driver – who came into today’s race as the title-favourite – was left with no room and crashed out with the Trident of Zendeli to end his championship campaign in the gravel and bring out the safety car.

It was now in Piastri’s hands – who jumped up to seventh – just ahead of his final title-rival Pourchaire.

On the restart, 17-year old Pourchaire was on the charge, jumping up from eigth to sixth, meanwhile, the championship leader dropped down to ninth as the door opened for the French driver to take the championship if he could take the podium.

Upfront, Lawson began stretching his lead with a handful of fastest laps stretching his lead over Alex Smolyar to 1.6s

Back with the title fight – Pourchaire began applying the pressure to Enzo Fittipaldi’s fifth place.

Beckmann then passed Smolyar for second as Vesti lunged passed his Prema team-mate Piastri for ninth place – to leave the Renault Academy driver under serious pressure in regards to the championship.

Fernandez then demoted Smolyar to fourth as the ART driver struggled for speed.

The Russian driver then lost two places in one corner as Fittipaldi went to the inside and critically Pourchaire to the outside.

The 17-year old continued to charge – immediately moving clear of the HWA of Fittipaldi for fourth.

This left him one place away from taking the F3 crown – with his team-mate just ahead of him.

Vesti was then warned to pass Smolyar ahead or let Piastri through for the championship – the Danish driver chose to attack – demoting the ART driver to ninth.

Lap 16 was huge for the championship – Pourchaire moved to the net championship lead by passing Fernandez – but His rival struck straight back – by sweeping around the outside of Smolyar.

The Australian then saw off Vesti to add some comfort to his situation.

His rival struggled to get into Beckmann’s DRS to no avail – as team-mate Fernandez slipped back.

At the flag ART’s Fernandez was pipped by Piastri in a drag race to the line as the Australian was crowned champion.