The heat has been turned up as the Formula 2 drivers brace themselves for their last two races of the season. Five of them still in with a shout of winning the Championship.
Mick Schumacher still leads in the Championship on 205 points ahead of Callum Ilott, who trails the Prema Racing driver by 14 points. Those two are the favourites, but three other drivers are still in with a shout.
Third to fifth in the title race are separated by only five points. Nikita Mazepin is in third on 162 points, Robert Shwartzman in fourth on 159 points and Yuki Tsunoda in fifth on 157 points.
This race will not be like the one last weekend as Bahrain International Circuit’s outer layout will be used. More or less a Nascar type of race is in store for us fans, journalists and motorsport fanatics.
Instead of facing 15 turns, they’ll face 11 with most of the lap flat out at high speed. The track also contains three straights and will surely test the speed of some of the F2 cars that we may not see on a regular basis.
Last week’s races were hectic and really unexpected in a sense. The Feature Race saw Ilott start from pole position with Felipe Drugovich joining the Brit on the front row.
The MP Motorsport driver went on to win the race from P2 with Ilott still grabbing a second-place finish. Jehan Daruvala completed the podium with his maiden podium finish.
The Championship leader rescued 12 points from the first race of the weekend as he drove his car up to fourth from tenth at the start.
Mazepin scored ten points as he moved up two places from his starting position finishing fifth. Tsunoda made a fantastic recovery drive after starting from the back of the grid. He moved all the way up to sixth and recorded the fastest lap to earn two bonus points.
Finally, Shwartzman started in the midfield in 14th and scored four points from race one with his eighth-placed finish.
Race Two saw the Championship race turn ever so slightly. Ilott punted Daruvala in turn ten as the UNI-Virtuosi driver looked to get past his Championship rival, Mick Schumacher.
Instead, the Brit locked up and smashed into the Carlin car taking Daruvala out of the race and his chances of scoring decent points from the race.
Shwartzman managed to get the victory and 15 points in the process. Mazepin and Louis Deletraz joined the Prema driver on the podium finishing second and third respectively.
Schumacher finished seventh that race and took two points away from what Ilott gained in the previous race. Tsunoda after a puncture on lap one never recovered the deficit and finished 15th with Ilott finishing just behind the Carlin in 16th.
46 points are still on the line this weekend and we will eventually see an outright F2 champion, but who will it be and will the title race go down to the final race?
Follow us on Twitter @ProstInt