A five-second time penalty denied Gabriel Bortoleto victory as Paul Aron secured his first FIA Formula 2 win of the season in a thrilling Feature race in Lusail.
The Brazilian, who joins Sauber in Formula 1 next season, was handed the penalty for a pit lane infringement after swerving to avoid the entry when the Safety Car was deployed.
Bortoleto crossed the line first, with Aron second. A frantic battle with title rival Isack Hadjar at the end to see if the five-second gap could be created failed, the Frenchman third across the line but second in the end, just within the gap.
Oliver Goethe was a brilliant fourth, with Dino Beganovic equally as impressive in fifth. Christian Mansell secured more points with sixth, with Amaury Cordeel seventh.
John Bennett, making his F2 debut after completing the GB3 title, finished an amazing eighth, with Zane Maloney ninth in his final F2 race, and Ritomo Riyata in 10th.
How the race unfolded
At the start, Bortoleto launched into the lead with Aron retaining second after almost being squeezed by Beganovic and Martins. Bearman moved up to eighth with Hadjar 10th.
Bortoleto was seven tenths ahead at the end of the first lap, with Joshua Durksen and Luke Browning jostling for position further down the order. With DRS now enabled, Aron was within enough to keep himself within touch of Bortoleto.
Bearman took Maini for seventh, the Indian immediately losing eighth to Antonelli. The Invicta’s hard tyres were causing Maini to fall away, with Goethe and Hadjar displacing him and leaving him out of the top 10.
At the beginning of lap five, Bortoleto was able to inch away from Aron, but not enough to move him away from the Estonian’s DRS.
The first to pit was Jak Crawford, followed by Zane Maloney and Christian Mansell. Aron would box one lap later, having chipped a couple of tenths off of Bortoleto’s lead, who stayed out for an extra lap.
Antonelli retired due to a broken suspension caused by a pit lane collision with Richard Verschoor, the Dutchman unsafely released into the young Italian’s path. Bortoleto was inches away from making the stop, but due to the Virtual Safety Car being brought out to clear Antonelli’s Prema, the Invicta quickly turned out of the pit entry before the point of no return, but was to the right of the bollard, potentially putting him in trouble with race control.
On lap 10, the full Safety Car was deployed, giving Bortoleto his opportunity to pit. He would resume the race under the Safety Car in seventh, effectively the lead car as the first of all who had changed tyres. Bearman led on the road, with Durksen, Maini, Max Esterson, Browning and Pepe Marti ahead.
Bortoleto was handed a five-second time penalty for the pit entry infringement, giving ninth-placed Hadjar the current advantage.
At. the restart, Bearman held his lead withe Durksen swarming all over the Prema. Bortoleto immediately was in the thick of action, fending-off Aron after being forced wide by Marti. Further back, Rafael Villagomez and Crawford came together at turn six, spinning the Mexican out and bringing out the Safety Car once more. The American would return to the pits and retire. his steering arm bent in the incident.
The Safety Car would dive into the pits at the end of lap 16, but Bearman slid off at the final corner before the star of the lap, handing Durksen the lead, but had to hand the Englishman the lead back, bringing him into the clutches of Maini and Browning, who both swamped him. The drama left Bearman back in-front and with an immediate seven-tenths lead. Bortoleto was finally ahead of Marti in fifth.
At turn six, there was more contact, with Maloney spinning himself into last place as Martins and Esterson spun each-other just ahead of him.
In fifth, Bortoleto still had the net race lead but still have the five second penalty to contend with, and began to challenge Durksen for fourth. Hadjar was now seventh.
Marti spun and found himself down in 16th. With 14 minutes of racing time remaining, Durksen snatched third from Browning, and then took second from Maini a lap later.
Bortoleto fails to create gap to lose title lead
Bortoleto was now fourth but still only around a second ahead of Hadjar, with only 12 minutes now left. On the radio, Bortoleto frantically requested team-mate Maini move out of his way to help his championship challenge. Maini would pit at the end of the lap, and Aron would take Browning for fourth.
Hadjar quickly moved up to fifth, and now still within the buffer made by Bortoleto’s penalty. Goethe, Browning and Beganovic would go three abreast, the German making the most of the opportunity and taking sixth, with Mansell now up to eighth.
Bearman was now five seconds ahead but still required to pit for tyres, with Durksen in the same predicament. Bortoleto was still net leader but with Aron behind him, he would need to take Durksen to maintain any hope of creating a buffer from Hadjar in fifth, who was now almost three seconds behind, still two within Bortoleto’s penalty.
With just under six minutes to go, Bortoleto sent it up the inside of Durksen at turn one, and with four minutes left, Aron moved up to third. Bearman was now finally called into the pits, handing Bortoleto the lead on the road as well as net. It would not be impossible for a five second gap to be created from Hadjar, now three-and-a-half seconds behind his rival.
With two-and-a-half minutes remaining, Bearman boxed with Durksen, releasing Hadjar.
The gap was now just under four seconds with just over a minute left, leaving it down to a nail-biting final few corners.
On the final lap, it would be 4.3 seconds between the title challengers, with Goethe now just behind Hadjar.
Bortoleto would cross the line first, with Aron benefitting from the penalty to hand Aron his first F2 win of the season, and Hadjar just keeping within five seconds to take second. Bortoleto would claim third, with Goethe taking a brilliant fourth spot.
With now only one weekend and two races to go, the gap at the top of the Drivers’ standings is half a point in Bortoleto’s favour.
