General
Chaos in Spa F3 race: Voisin wins, Lindblad drops out of title race
- Ludo van Denderen
There's still long way to go in the Formula 1 season, but for the juniors in Formula 3, the season is almost over. After the summer break, only a race weekend awaits the young drivers in Monza, where it will be definitively clear who will run away with the title. In the penultimate weekend, during the feature race in Belgium, Leonardo Fornaroli and Luke Browning certainly did well. The Italian took precious points with his third place, and Browning finished P6. Competitors Gabriele Mini and Arvid Lindblad did not score, with the latter becoming virtually out of the championship hunt.
Prior to the feature race, Mini was the championship leader, but starting from midfield, things went wrong for the Italian at the very first corner. He was nudged by Red Bull junior Goethe, after which Mini spun and had to start a huge catch-up race from the very back. Mini was lucky that after a few laps, the safety car had to enter the track, and he caught up with the rest of the field. The safety car was necessary after Stenshorne made a mistake during a failed overtaking attempt, after which he spun, and Taponen was unable to avoid him.
Safety cars follow each other in quick succession
After the safety car returned to the pitlane, it took just one lap before it had to re-enter the track. It was Loake and Floersch who collided, with the latter getting stuck in the gravel. Unfortunately, the laps at Spa are particularly long, so a lot of race time is lost once the safety car is on track. But with six of the 15 laps to go, Callum Voisin - who had started from pole and since maintained the lead - was allowed to restart the field, hoping that the rest of the race could be completed without any problems.
But as it often happens in racing: from one safety car comes the next safety car. At Spa, the story was no different: the second restart was barely over when Arvid Lindblad was tapped by Mansell - and got stuck in the gravel. A little further along, it was almost at the same time Boya crashed into the wall. The result? A safety car period for the third time, which ended only two laps before the finish.
Voisin kept his cool in the closing stages and drove to his first win in Formula 3. Behind him, Sebastian Montoya crossed the line in second place, ahead of Fornaroli. This Italian took over the championship lead from Mini with his podium finish. The Prema team could celebrate. They secured the teams' title.