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The Championship lead is down to 14 points between Mick Schumacher and Callum Ilott, but the latter crashed into Jehan Daruvala and banished his chances of biting more out of Schumacher’s Championship lead.
It was Schumacher’s teammate, Robert Schwartzman that took the race win in a comfortable fashion. Nikita Mazpin managed to recover after a poor start to get second place and a fantastic recovery drive from Louis Deletraz saw him go onto the third step of the podium.
Marcus Armstrong came across the line in fourth ahead of Ilott’s UNI-Virtuosi teammate, Guanyu Zhou, who took fifth place. Christian Lundgaard finished sixth, Mick Schumacher seventh and Felipe Drugovich took eighth place in the Sprint Race.
As It Happened
Robert Shwartzman got a good start as Yuki Tsunoda launched himself to second ahead of Marcus Armstrong.
Tsunoda then tumbled down the order as he got a right rear puncture from a collision involving him and Armstrong. The pit-stop he made dropped him all the way to the back of the grid.
Nikita Mazpein moved ahead of Mick Schumacher into Turn One as the Russian looked to chip away at the Prema Racing driver’s Championship lead. The German got the place back into Turn Four but unfortunately lost the position for good as the Hitech car manoeuvred his way ahead a lap later into Turn One.
Mazepin made up another place not long after that as he cleared Jehan Daruvala and moved his car into third place.
Theo Pourchaire released a Safety Car as he stopped his car and retired from the race.
A pivotal moment in the Championship balance happened after the restart. Callum Ilott seized the opportunity to move ahead of Schumacher, but the Brit locked up and smashed into Daruvala. Ilott pitted for a front-wing change and Daruvala retired from the race.
A rear lockup from Armstrong saw Mazepin move ahead of the Australian ART driver and into second place as Mazepin’s teammate, Luca Ghiotto, retired from the race.
Armstrong not long after was a sitting duck as Pedro Piquet moved ahead of the ART and into the final podium place.
Ilott was given a drive-through penalty for causing a collision between him and Daruvala which saw the Carlin driver retire from the race.
The UNI-Virtuosi team would have cheered Guanyu Zhou on as their driver moved ahead of Schumacher in the race.
Deletraz went on the charge as he dispatched Felipe Drugovich, Artem Markelov, Christian Lundgaard, Mick Schumacher, Guanyu Zhou and Marcus Armstrong. A podium was in sight for the Swiss driver which was made simple when Piquet allowed him to go through as the Brazillian struggled with a problem.
Shwartzman won the race comfortably ahead of Mazepin in second and Deletraz in third.
Formula 2 action will be back next week as the season finale returns to Abu Dhabi and still plenty of points to tip the Championship in one way or another.
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