FIA Formula 2 Championship leader Frederik Vesti’s electric end to the Barcelona Feature Race was a notable highlight of Sunday’s race.
The Danish racer was the fastest car on track by some margin by virtue of opting for the alternate strategy and benefiting from Pirelli’s softer rubber in the closing laps.
With the championship challenge continuing so well, Vesti explained to insideF2 that finishing the race was more important than silverware.
“I wanted to get fourth and even third. But… I didn’t want to crash. That was the first priority.
“Also, I was trying to keep managing the tyres, because as soon as you go all out, you have one or two laps of performance and the option tyre just dies. That’s a little bit of what happened to me on the last few laps.”
Before the grip levels dropped, Vesti repeatedly set the timing screens purple. We asked how he enjoyed returning to the track with the fresh tyres.
“Well, it’s the best ever! Managing a good prime stint is difficult.
“I think we were a little bit lucky that the other strategy group got caught in some traffic, which is the risk of doing option-to-prime. To come out in the top five is amazing on the new option.”
ART’s Victor Martins was another driver that made the alternate strategy work in his favour en route to a P3 finish.
After pitting even later than Vesti, the Frenchman emerged from the pit lane a few seconds ahead of his PREMA rival.
Vesti immediately ate into the gap behind Martins but ultimately ran out of tyre life and laps to get by.
“We were a lot quicker than Victor. But by the time I caught him, he was already on [Ayumua] Iwasa.
“We were fighting a little bit, the three cars. And I pushed – probably a little bit too hard to try and get Victor. Once he got past I didn’t really have the rear tyres to remain.”
Image: PREMA Racing
