Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Ferrari junior Leclerc wins F2 finale with a stellar last lap move

Ferrari Formula 1 junior Charles Leclerc claimed a stunning final Formula 2 victory as he passed Alexander Albon with a dramatic last lap move in the Abu Dhabi sprint race

Albon had led the 22-lap race up until the final tour, but Leclerc attacked him aggressively at the Turn 7 hairpin.

The pair touched at the slow corner but Leclerc backed off before attacking again on the following straight, squeezing through on the inside on the run to Turn 8 as Albon defended fiercely.

But Leclerc got by to take a seventh F2 win in his rookie title-winning season by 1.2 seconds over Albon, with DAMS driver Nicholas Latifi completing the podium.

At the start, polesitter Jordan King was slow away, as Albon and Nobuharu Matsushita shot by from second and third.

Matsushita attacked his team-mate at Turn 1, but got pinched against the apex and had to back off, which allowed Latifi to sweep in second as King was shuffled down to sixth behind the fast-starting Leclerc.

Leclerc and King swapped places on the opening tour as Albon consolidated his lead over Latifi, careful to nip clear of the 1s DRS detection range.

Albon continued to preserve that gap while Leclerc was bottled up behind King, the Prema Racing driver eventually getting past the Briton on lap four.

Leclerc initially made little progress to catch the leaders - the quartet up front completed by McLaren junior Nyck de Vries - before he began to home in heading towards the middle part of the race.

He caught and passed de Vries with a textbook DRS-move heading into Turn 8 and then set about catching and dispatching Matsushita and Latifi before setting up the final lap action with Albon.

The final tour showdown was set up by yellow flags - necessitated by Louis Deletraz and the fading de Vries clashing at Turn 13 and the Rapax driver pulling off one corner later - preventing Leclerc from passing into Turn 11 or using DRS at the Yas Marina track's two activation points.

But in the end, he forced his way by, with Matsushita following the top three home ahead of Luca Ghiotto and Artem Markelov in fifth and sixth - a result that clinches the 2017 F2 teams' title for the Russian Time squad.

Oliver Rowland put in a sensational charge from last on the grid to make the points in seventh after losing his feature race win due to a technical infringement.

The Renault F1 development driver rose from 20th to 13th on the first lap and then put in a series of breath-taking passes before getting stuck behind Markelov.

Sergio Sette Camara scored the final point ahead of de Vries and Roberto Merhi.

Lando Norris battled his way to 13th - picking up a five-second penalty during his duels with Sean Gelael and Santino Ferrucci, who were 14th and 15th respectively.

King was the other retirement, stopping in the pits a few laps after picking up a puncture when Markelov clipped his left-rear tyre as they fought over seventh.

Race two result

Pos Driver Team Laps Gap
1 Charles Leclerc Prema Racing 22 41m36.188s
2 Alexander Albon ART Grand Prix 22 1.293s
3 Nicholas Latifi DAMS 22 3.207s
4 Nobuharu Matsushita ART Grand Prix 22 4.105s
5 Luca Ghiotto RUSSIAN TIME 22 4.952s
6 Artem Markelov RUSSIAN TIME 22 14.758s
7 Oliver Rowland DAMS 22 15.446s
8 Sergio Sette Camara MP Motorsport 22 24.795s
9 Nyck de Vries Racing Engineering 22 29.261s
10 Roberto Merhi Rapax 22 29.689s
11 Antonio Fuoco Prema Racing 22 29.912s
12 Alex Palou Campos Racing 22 30.999s
13 Lando Norris Campos Racing 22 31.564s
14 Sean Gelael Pertamina Arden 22 38.714s
15 Santino Ferrucci Trident 22 39.605s
16 Nabil Jeffri Trident 22 43.310s
17 Gustav Malja Racing Engineering 22 49.659s
18 Norman Nato Pertamina Arden 19 3 Laps
- Louis Deletraz Rapax 18 Retirement
- Jordan King MP Motorsport 11 Retirement

Final drivers' standings

Pos Driver Points
1 Charles Leclerc 282
2 Artem Markelov 210
3 Oliver Rowland 191
4 Luca Ghiotto 185
5 Nicholas Latifi 178
6 Nobuharu Matsushita 131
7 Nyck de Vries 114
8 Antonio Fuoco 98
9 Norman Nato 91
10 Alexander Albon 86
11 Jordan King 62
12 Sergio Sette Camara 47
13 Gustav Malja 44
14 Sergio Canamasas 21
15 Sean Gelael 17
16 Johnny Cecotto Jr. 16
17 Louis Deletraz 16
18 Roberto Merhi 16
19 Ralph Boschung 11
20 Sergey Sirotkin 9
21 Alex Palou 5
22 Santino Ferrucci 4
23 Nabil Jeffri 2
24 Robert Visoiu 1
25 Lando Norris 0
26 Callum Ilott 0
27 Stefano Coletti 0
28 Rene Binder 0
29 Raffaele Marciello 0


Be part of the Autosport community

Join the conversation
Previous article McLaren F1 reserve Lando Norris picks Carlin for 2018 F2 move
Next article Prema completes 2018 Formula 2 line-up with McLaren's Nyck de Vries

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe