McLaren F1 junior Nyck de Vries took his maiden Formula 2 victory with a commanding drive around the streets of Monaco.
De Vries jumped polesitter and team-mate Johnny Cecotto Jr. at the start into Turn 1, veteran Cecotto completed Rapax’s maiden 1-2 in the sport with his first podium since the 2016 season finale in Abu Dhabi.
Swedish driver Gustav Malja completed the top three for Racing Engineering ahead of Luca Ghiotto who just fell short of the podium.
Artem Markelov wrestled fifth place from Alexander Albon on lap 21, to slash the gap to championship leader Charles Leclerc to just 19 points.
ART Grand Prix’s Albon ended the race in sixth position, his sixth consecutive points finish in his rookie F2 season.
Honda junior driver Nobuharu Matsushita was seventh with Jordan King rounding out the points paying positions. Oliver Rowland failed to add to his points tally for the weekend in ninth.
Spaniard Sergio Canamasas creamed into the back of the British driver at the penultimate corner with just a handful of laps to go, Rowland survived but Canamasas was forced to make a pitstop for a new front wing.
Fuoco was forced to settle for tenth place after losing out by the narrowest of margins to Rowland.
Norman Nato’s miserable run of form continued as he retired for the third race time in five races, following contact with Charles Leclerc.
Leclerc made a couple of moves early on at Anthony Noghes but he collided with Nato at that very same corner and received a ten-second penalty. He later retired on lap 22.
Ralph Boschung was the third retirement in the race with another mechanical issue, extending Campos Racing’s 2017 points drought.
