George Russell managed to hold off a late charge from Prema Racing’s Nyck de Vries to win the fifth round of the 2018 Formula 2 season and take his first feature race win.
However, Russell’s win is under investigation after the Brit threw his water bottle out of the car under the VSC, after it came loose. He was granted permission by his ART Grand Prix team before doing so.
The Mercedes junior jumped into second place at the start from third following a poor start from polesitter Alexander Albon. Russell then quickly made light work of leader de Vries and was able to control the race from there-on-in to win in Barcelona.
De Vries slotted behind in second place despite a late charge during the second stint. He had been demoted to third during the first stint by the recovering Albon but was able to make his way back past as the Thai driver when Albon’s tyres started to deteriorate towards the end of the first stint.
Albon ended up in fifth place after being jumped by Lando Norris during the pitstops and passed by Campos driver Luca Ghiotto. He had originally recovered well from his poor start but eventually fell back down the field into fifth.
Championship leader Norris rounded out the podium with a great drive from eighth to third. He employed a different strategy to most by going from soft to medium tyres and was able to jump himself from fifth to third during the pitstops. This came after a strong start from the McLaren junior and an intense battle with fellow Brit Jack Aitken who finished in sixth.
Ghiotto came home in fourth for Campos and earnt some much-needed points for the team. He had good pace all race and made some key moves, most notably his pass on Albon just before the pitstop phase.
Artem Markelov managed to beat his team-mate Tadasuke Makino in a late race battle to secure reverse grid pole for tomorrow’s sprint race. This followed another strong recovery drive from the Russian who used a late pitstop to his advantage to finish eighth after starting 19th.
Carlin’s Sergio Sette Camara and Charouz driver Antonio Fuoco rounded out the top 10 after they finished in seventh and 10th places respectively.
The race was littered with virtual safety cars with a total of four being deployed during the race. The first was for the spinning Max Gunther who managed to beach himself in the gravel on the outside of Turn 2 on lap 1.
The two MP Motorsport cars clashed at Turn 1 in the early stages of the race, leaving Ralph Boschung in the wall and Roberto Merhi with a broken wing. Merhi could only manage a 13th place finish.
Arjun Maini in the trident spun at Turn 4 midway through the race while Louis Deletraz and Sean Gelael clashed going into Turn 1 after Deletraz moved aggressively under braking. The collision put both cars out of the race.
