Formula 2 Sprint Race
The Sprint race turned out dramatic but was brought to an abrupt end by a huge crash involving Luca Ghiotto and Jack Aitken on lap 8. The race was red flagged and not restarted post that. The biggest loser was Jehan Daruvala who had to serve a 5-second penalty for track limit infringement at Turn 2 and dropped out of points as a result, despite running fifth at the time of stoppage.
China’s Guanyu Zhou took his first ever Formula 2 victory followed by home hero Nikita Mazepin who would be disappointed as he seemed to have a very good chance of taking the victory. Championship leader Mick Schumacher came home third to further extend his lead. Jack Aitken and Luca Ghiotto were classified fourth and fifth despite crashing out which brought out the red flag as the classification was back tracked to lap 5 order. Yuki Tsunoda, Callum Illot and Dan Ticktum took home the final points as only the top 8 are awarded points in the sprint race as compared to the feature race.
With the Russia round done, Formula 2 now takes a 2 month break to be back for the final 2 rounds at Bahrain in November.
Formula 1 Race
Lewis Hamilton’s quest for his record equalling 91st race win did not get off a start as expected as he was under investigation for doing practice starts at the fast lane of the pit lane. Invariably which got his two 5 second penalties which he had to serve during his pitstop. Hamilton held the lead at the end of the long straight to Turn 2 but it was carnage at the back. Carlos Sainz couldn’t clearly make through the runoff area and ended up crashing into the barriers and the Racing Point of Lance Stroll got hit by Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari taking the Racing point out of the race. A safety car was deployed to clear the cars and the likes of Lando Norris, Alex Albon and George Russell pitted for hard tires.
It was a clean restart from Lewis Hamilton and maintained the lead till he pitted and thus taking his 10 seconds penalty and falling way back to P11. It was a superb start from Estaben Ocon who got into P4 till his first round of pitstops. Valterri Bottas and Max Verstappen kept on piling laps on the mediums they had started the race with unlike the softs of many who were trailing them. Hamilton and Bottas fought for the fastest lap but in the end, it was Valterri Bottas who went home with a maximum available of 26 points taken. Max Verstappen came home second and Hamilton third, thus making it the 6th time of 10 races in 2020 that these 3 had shared the podium. Sergio Perez had a fighting race to come home fourth and Daniel Ricciardo came home fifth despite being handing a 5 second penalty for leaving the track and not joining as per steward’s directions at Turn 2. Charles Leclerc ended at a fine sixth place for Scuderia Ferrari who are struggling for pace this year. Estaben Ocon had a lot of defending to do to come to seventh, just ahead of the home hero Danill Kvyat. Pierre Gasly made it a double point finish for Alpha Tauri, and the Red bull of Alex Albon took out the final point available. The tussle between the three good friends off the track and regular twitch streamers Russell, Albon and Norris put up a nice show with a 3-way scrap at the back of the field.
At the end of the 10th round of F1 2020 season, Lewis Hamilton leads the championship with a 44-point lead over Bottas and also looking for his 91st race win which will equal him with Michael Schumacher. Among the constructors, Mercedes lead the way with 366 points followed by Redbull at 192 points. The fight for the 3rd position is between McLaren, Racing Point and Renault all separated by just 7 points.
The next round of F1 2020 season is scheduled to take place at the brilliant track of Nürburgring on the 11th of October.