Marcus Armstrong and DAMS win in Jeddah, followed closely by the Hitech pair of Liam Lawson and Jüri Vips in a thrilling first race of this weekend’s Formula 2.

Armstrong managed to take the lead from second on the grid, behind reverse grid pole-sitter, Lawson. Lawson argued that he was pushed wide into Turn 2 which meant his fellow Kiwi was able to take the position.

A crash between Guilherme Samaia and Marino Sato brought out the first Safety Car. Olli Caldwell ran into the back of Samaia’s Charouz which created a domino effect to catch out Sato at Turn 5 on the first lap.

Caldwell was able to continue the race but was forced to pit with a damaged front wing. The stewards found that the young Brit was at fault for the collision and was awarded with a 10 second time penalty,

It didn’t take long for another incident to occur, this time between Championship contender, Guanyu Zhou and Christian Lundgaard. Zhou pitted on Lap 4 to repair his front wing. He vocalised his disappointment on the radio as he felt that Lundgaard left him no room on the inside of Turn 2.

Dan Ticktum had an interesting battle with Bent Viscaal. They were wheel-to-wheel for a sequence of corners until Ticktum overshot the corner and took 11th place off track.

Carlin made the decision to tell their driver to return the position to avoid a potential penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage. He did eventually retake the place a few laps later with a brave move to the inside.

Théo Pourchaire found the wall at Turn 22, losing the rear of the car after being part of a chaotic five car battle. Until his crash, he had been running in seventh place, keeping behind Oscar Piastri.

Jehan Daruvala made a statement with an incredibly opportunistic move on Piastri and Lundgaard. Daruvala proved that overtaking is possible around the Jeddah circuit as he made up two positions in one corner.

It was a close finish at the end as the front two, Armstrong and Lawson were separated by just over a tenth of a second. Not only them, but also Lundgaard, Ticktum and Piastri kept the drama flowing until the very last corner as those three also, were only separated by one tenth of a second.

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