Formula 2: A strange race in Monaco was won by Crawford

      Alex Dunn is making his debut season in Formula 2, but he has already attracted attention: he has two wins and a podium, and it was he who led the individual series standings after four stages.

      It was the Irish Rodin Motorsport racer and a member of the McLaren youth team who won qualifying in Monaco on Friday, but the experienced Victor Martin lost just 0.003 seconds to him. He has had a lot of bad luck this year, including in yesterday's sprint, he couldn't avoid trouble, after which he finished only 17th, although he drove the best lap of the race.

      After all this, on Sunday morning, the French ART racer was not in the best of spirits and felt a strong desire to recoup, because before the weekend in Monaco he was included among the favorites. As the subsequent development of events showed, he soon had more reasons for frustration.

      The surprises started even before the start: as in Imola, for some reason, Sebastian Montoya could not go to the warm-up lap, who showed a very decent fifth result in qualifying, but now, at best, he will have to start from the pit lane.

      However, what happened next was that Martin pulled off perfectly and was about to take the lead, but Dunn did not want to give up the lead, and there was a hard contact between the cars at turn 1. Both ended up in a bump, blocking the track, and several other riders crashed into them at full speed.

      Of course, red flags were immediately posted, but only a little more than half of the starting cars returned to the pits, while the rest remained on the track in a massive blockage with some kind of damage, mostly quite serious and precluding further participation in the race.

      Here is a complete list of those who were able to avoid big problems and were preparing for the restart: Leonardo Fornaroli, Arvid Lindblad, Jack Crawford, Joshua Durksen, Roman Stanek, Luke Browning, Oliver Goethe, Rafael Villagomes, Sebastian Montoya, Dino Beganovich, Keane Shields, Sami Megetunif, Amaury Cordil and John Bennett. In total, 15 of the 22 two cars survived.

      And it turned out that Montoya was even lucky that his car stalled on the starting field – at least he was able to avoid the blockage, and his Dallara of the Prema team survived. Moreover, when the restart order was announced, it turned out that Sebastian would move to the 2nd position behind the new leader, Leonardo Fornaroli!

      By the way, Gabriele Mini's car was not damaged either, but he had to turn off the overheating engine, and the Prema team was negotiating with the race management, trying to get permission to continue the race. But the problem is that the Italian's car was parked behind the track fence from the outside between the turns of Sainte Devote and Beau Rivage, and it was problematic to send mechanics there. As a result, the team was not given such permission.

      On the video replay, it was clearly visible that Martin started clearly better than the hesitant Dunn and was already half a car length ahead of Alex before the first corner, therefore, he had every right to an optimal trajectory, but the Irishman openly rammed him. However, he did it not intentionally, but in the heat of the attack. Which, of course, does not absolve him of the blame for what happened, so the stewards will continue to sort out this incident after the finish.

      The race management decided that the restart would be given for the safety car, and the cars would line up behind it in the same order as they had initially been at the end of qualifying – minus those eliminated, of course. It turned out that Fornaroli was the first in this line, followed by Montoya, then Lindblad, Crawford, Browning, Maini, Durksen, Goethe, Stanek, Beganovich, etc.

      The pause required to evacuate the wrecked equipment and repair the damaged fences lasted about 40 minutes, but finally a restart was given. At the same time, the race time was reduced to a little over half an hour, so the participants will have time to drive much fewer laps. In fact, the main race of the weekend turned into another sprint, but with a mandatory pit stop.

      When the safety car turned into the pit lane and the fight on the track began, it turned out that not everyone had drawn conclusions after what happened at turn 1 and had moderated their ardor. Durksen immediately tried to attack Kush Maini, but he failed on the climb towards Rivage, but he continued to try, and it all ended with the fact that at the end of the lap, the Indian rider seemed to slow down a little earlier, and the Paraguayan was caught off guard.

      He did not have time to react, sharply jerked the steering wheel to the right, the front wheel of his car caught the rear right wheel of Durksen's car, after which it changed its trajectory and crashed into a bump.

      The virtual safety car (VSC) mode was introduced, but not for long, as Durksen's car and the debris from it were quickly removed, and the race resumed. Pit stops began almost immediately, but the entire leading group remained on the track for the time being.

      Fornaroli was in the lead, Montoya was chasing him closely, and Lindblad was behind him with the same half-second interval, having already pulled away from Crawford by a couple of seconds, although it was the American who showed the best lap of this stage of the race. However, this achievement was soon taken over by Oliver Goethe, who had already been in the pits and was riding tenth.

      Half of the 30 minutes allotted for the race were already behind us, but then the fight was again neutralized by a virtual safety car, this time due to the fact that Dino Beganovich lost control of the car at the exit of the Casino turn and crashed into the barriers. Then the VSC mode was replaced by the departure of a real safety car, and many decided to take advantage of this and make a pit stop.

      However, Fornaroli, Montoya and Lindblad had already passed the entrance to the pit lane, so they stayed on the track and had to drive another lap, after which they also turned into the pit lane.

      But now the balance of power has changed: Crawford was in the lead, Fornaroli was second, Lindblad was third, and Montoya, having lost a couple of positions, was only fourth, which made him very upset and tried to make claims to the team on the radio. But the engineer reasoned with him, asked him to calm down and focus on piloting.

      But then the race management decided that since the fences were damaged due to Beganovich's accident, there was no time to repair them, and decided to stop the race with red flags. Everyone returned to the pit lane, and it became clear that the victory in this situation was awarded to Crawford. Jack and his team got their bearings first and made a pit stop as soon as the safety car pulled out, and it was absolutely the right decision that secured the first place for the American DAMS racer.

      Leo Fornaroli took second place, but Sebastian Montoya rose to third, as Arvid Lindblad received a 5-second penalty for speeding in the pit lane, which caused him to fall back to fifth position.

      In general, Sunday's race was an example of the complete chaos that motorsport competitions can turn into at the legendary Monaco circuit.

      It would seem that the saying "You drive more quietly, you will continue" completely contradicts the racing spirit, but, for example, Crawford, today's winner, admitted that as soon as he learned about Beganovich's accident, he deliberately slowed down and that's why he managed to turn into the pit lane before everyone else, as a result of which he rose to the highest step of the podium..

      The stewards have yet to make a decision on the incident at the start, but it is already clear that the leader has changed in the individual standings: Luke Browning came out ahead, Alex Dunn dropped to second place, and Leonardo Fornaroli closes the top three.

      The next stage of the season will take place in a week in Barcelona.

      Race results

      Pilot

       Team

       Difference

      

      1. D.Crawford

       DAMS

      1:04'00.825

      2. L.Fornaroli

       Invicta Racing

       +6.693

      3. S.Montoya

       Prema

       +8.205

      4. L.Browning

       Hitech GP

       +12.073

      5. A.Lindblad

       Campos Racing

       +12.284

      6. K.Maini

       DAMS

       +17.227

      7. P.Stanek

       Invicta Racing

       +19.392

      8. R.Villagomes

       Van Amersfoort Racing

       +21.711

      9. O.Goethe

       MP Motorsport

       +37.965

      10. D.Bennett

       Van Amersfoort Racing

       +50.541

      11. K.Shields

       AIX Racing

       +1'03.075

      12. A.Kordil

       Rodin Motorsport

       +1 lap

      13. S.Megetunif

       Trident

       +1 lap

      – D.Beganovich

       Hitech GP

       The gathering

      – D.Durksen

       AIX Racing

       The gathering

      – A.Dunn

       Rodin Motorsport

       gathering

      – V.Martin

       ART Grand Prix

       gathering

      – The river Fershor

       MP Motorsport

       gathering

      – G.Mini

       Prema

       gathering

      – R.Miata

       ART Grand Prix

       The gathering

      of the X .Marty

       Campos Racing

       The gathering

      – M.Esterson

       Trident

       The gathering