Formula 2: Nikola Tsolov won the race at Red Bull Ring

      The starting grid of the Sunday Formula 2 race promised an interesting development of events right from its early stages, as most of the drivers in the youth series, whose cars occupied the first three rows, had something to fight for.

      Noël León, the pole holder, Alex Dunn, who showed the second fastest time in qualifying, Nikola Tsolov, Gabriel Mini, and Rafael Camara are in the top five of the individual standings, albeit in a different order, and at this stage of the season, every earned point is crucial.

      The drivers of the Campos Racing team had the best start: León maintained the lead only for the very first seconds, as Tsolov immediately overtook Dunn, after which he attacked and passed his teammate in the 3rd corner. However, at that time, an incident occurred in the back rows involving three cars: Joshua Dürksen, Rafael Villagómez, and Sebastián Montoya collided. The first two immediately retired due to damage to their cars, while the Paraguayan driver from Invicta Racing continued.

      The safety car was deployed, and Enzo Fittipaldi immediately went for a mandatory pit stop, which seemed like a questionable tactic, as the soft tires were unlikely to last the entire race distance of 40 laps. At that moment, there were only two laps behind.

      The restart was given on the fifth lap, Tsolov immediately began to increase his lead, and his team preferred to invite León for an early pit stop – firstly, this avoided fierce competition between teammates, and secondly, Noël found himself on clear track, although he dropped to 19th position.

      A couple of laps later, Tsolov also headed to the pits, but he was unlucky – there was a slight delay during the pit stop. Nevertheless, he returned to the track in 14th place – not only ahead of his teammate but also ahead of Dunn, which was even more important.

      However, shortly after, on the 11th lap, Gabriele Mini made his pit stop, and it seemed that this allowed him to overtake Tsolov, but the Bulgarian driver's tires were warmed up slightly better on the Dallara, so he soon made a careful pass and moved up to 9th position. Of course, the leader of the individual standings was not going to accept this and began to pressure Nikola.

      But the one who benefited the most from their skirmishes was Alex Dunn, who had pitted earlier, had already managed to pick up the optimal pace, and first overtook Mini, and then caught Tsolov on a small mistake and made a successful pass on the inside line in the same 3rd corner. There was a slight contact between the cars, but the stewards deemed the incident without consequences.

      At this stage of the race, Oliver Goethe was leading, followed by Tasanapol Intarufuwasak, Lawrence van Hoepen, Colton Herta, and Nico Varone, but they had not yet made their pit stops, nor had the entire top eight. Of course, the first contenders for the podium places were Dunn, Tsolov, Mini, and possibly Camara and Dürksen – if circumstances allowed.

      Halfway through the race, Goethe continued to lead the pack, although he was clearly lapping slower than, for example, Dunn, Tsolov, Mini, and Kimara, but he was in no hurry to pit. At the same time, his pace was already a second slower than the best lap time, which had been set by Camara.

      However, despite the drop in pace, the drivers temporarily in the lead group were delaying their mandatory pit stops, hoping for the appearance of the safety car, and this possibility could not be ruled out.

      At the end of the 24th lap, Alex Dunn made a mistake on the exit from the last corner, went off track, which Nikola Tsolov immediately took advantage of and overtook the Irishman. Moreover, just a lap later, he extended his lead to over a second, which did not allow Alex to counterattack using DRS.

      On the 26th lap, flames erupted from under the engine cover of Mari Boy's car, she lost speed and stopped at the edge of the track so abruptly that Colton Herta barely swerved to avoid her. The race director introduced a virtual safety car mode, and in this situation, pit stops were not allowed.

      As soon as the VSC mode was lifted, Tsolov accelerated rapidly and extended his lead over the nearest pursuer to two and a half seconds. Moreover, this pursuer was already Mini, who had managed to overtake Dunn.

      On the 30th lap, Goethe finally headed to the pit lane, and the other drivers who had not yet pitted followed his example, and on the next lap, Nikola Tsolov returned to the lead, which was quite expected. With fewer laps remaining until the finish, his advantage over Mini was quite noticeable, and the Bulgarian driver only needed to maintain a sufficiently high pace, conserve his tires, and not allow his opponents to get too close.

      On the 33rd lap, Rafael Camara attacked Dunn, whose tires were already far from being in the best condition, but Alex did not want to give way and simply pushed his opponent off the track. The stewards immediately took an interest in this incident, promising to conduct an investigation after the finish, while Camara continued his attempts to attack.

      The late pit stop tactic paid off for Oliver Goethe: he received fresh SuperSoft tires, overtook one opponent after another, and was already engaged in a battle with Dürksen for 5th position. The duel lasted quite a while but was successful; however, the German driver from MP Motorsport did not stop there, continued his decisive advance, and by the 37th lap had climbed to 3rd place, successfully dealing with Camara and Dunn.

      Meanwhile, the race concluded with Nikola Tsolov's fourth victory of the season, which he won quite convincingly: he saw the checkered flag 3.9 seconds ahead of Gabriele Mini. It is no wonder that he is being tipped for a move to Formula 1 next year. Oliver Goethe took the third step on the podium, marking his first such achievement in Formula 2.

      After the finish, Nikola emphasized that controlling tire wear in the heat was very challenging, and this was one of the main tasks – of course, alongside the necessity to push forward, but the participant of the Red Bull youth program managed to do this successfully, and importantly, at the Red Bull Ring circuit!

      Today's victory allowed Tsolov to reduce the gap in the individual standings to two points, although Mini still leads – at least for now. But Campos Racing, for which the Bulgarian driver competes, strengthened its position at the top of the team standings.

      

       Driver

       Team

       Time

       Difference

       Laps

      

      

      

      

       1. N.Tsolov

       Campos Racing

       56'10.538

       -

       40

      

      

       2. G.Mini

       MP Motorsport

       56'14.531

       3.993

       40

      

      

       3. O.Goethe

       MP Motorsport

       56'22.736

       12.198

       40

      

      

       4. R.Camara

       Invicta Racing

       56'25.441

       14.903

       40

      

      

       5. T.Intarufuwasak

       ART Grand Prix

       56'26.052

       15.514

       40

      

      

       6. M.Stenshorn

       Rodin Motorsport

       56'30.205

       19.667

       40

      

      

       7. A.Dunn

       Rodin Motorsport

       56'31.248

       20.710

       40

      

      

       8. N.León

       Campos Racing

       56'31.905

       21.367

       40

      

      

       9. L.van Hoepen

       Trident

       56'32.339

       21.801

       40

      

      

       10. J.Dürksen

       Invicta Racing

       56'32.987

       22.449

       40

      

      

       11. R.Bilinski

       DAMS Lucas Oil

       56'33.310

       22.772

       40

      

      

       12. D.Bennett

       Trident

       56'37.319

       26.781

       40

      

      

       13. K.Maini

       ART Grand Prix

       56'38.868

       28.330

       40

      

      

       14. D.Beganovich

       DAMS Lucas Oil

       56'41.804

       31.266

       40

      

      

       15. E.Fittipaldi

       AIX Racing

       56'41.838

       31.300

       40

      

      

       16. R.Miata

       Hitech

       56'43.528

       32.990

       40

      

      

       17. N.Varone

       Van Amersfoort Racing

       56'43.597

       33.059