Zak O’Sullivan pulled off a “1 in 1000 chance” victory in the Formula 2 feature race, beating Isack Hadjar and Paul Aron to the podium’s top step. Feeder Series caught up with the three drivers after the dramatic race.

By Steven Walton

Isack Hadjar was in prime position to win the Monaco feature race when he passed effective race leader Richard Verschoor on Lap 25. But victory slipped from Hadjar’s grasp with three laps to go when Joshua Dürksen crashed into Zane Maloney, causing yellow flags and triggering a virtual safety car.

This was a gift for race leader O’Sullivan, who started down in 15th and was the only driver who still had to pit. The Williams junior dived into the pit lane under the yellow flags and got his stop done without losing track position to Hadjar. Drivers are not allowed to serve their mandatory pit stop during a VSC, but O’Sullivan’s was legal as he was already in the pit lane when the VSC was deployed.

“To be honest, the timing was kind of perfect for me, it’s quite rare that you get that situation,” O’Sullivan told Feeder Series after the race. “It’s kind of a 1 in 1000 chance of it actually going your way. We always talk about it in strategy of ‘imagine if, imagine if’, and today we didn’t have to imagine it.”

Hadjar: Losing win was ‘really painful’

Hadjar had to settle for second because of O’Sullivan’s stroke of luck. The Campos driver was furious on the team radio after the chequered flag. “Man, you know what, don’t talk to me, okay, I don’t want to talk, it’s a joke,” he said. “No man, man you can’t say P2, you can’t say that, no, man can you believe what just happened or not, it’s a joke, man come on.”

When Hadjar later spoke to selected media, including Feeder Series, he had calmed down and said he was really happy about finishing second.

“The way we lost it at the end was really painful and that’s why I got super mad, but all good now,” he explained.

With the result, Hadjar has leapt ahead of former championship leader Zane Maloney in the standings. Hadjar now has 78 points and is second in the standings, two points behind new championship leader Paul Aron.

Hadjar told Feeder Series his biggest strengths this year were having speed in every session and understanding the car.

“We didn’t have the best sprint race performance and we always seem to really bounce back on the day that matters for the feature race, so we seem to understand the car really well which is the most important. I’ve been driving on a really high level, still need to improve the qualifying performance, I think I have the package to take pole already and I didn’t, so I try to do it next time.”

Aron takes the championship lead

Aron finished third in Monaco, elevating the Estonian to the lead of the championship.

Asked by Feeder Series who his biggest rivals would be for the title, Aron replied, “It’s a good question, but it’s a difficult question because like I said before, it’s really early in the championship.You know, after Imola, everybody was saying it was going to be me and Zane [Maloney] – Isack’s done a really good job in the last three rounds and now you know he’s only two points behind me.”

Maloney finished the feature race in 10th, leaving him third in the standings and 11 points behind Aron.

Aron said his strength this season was consistency. “As a rookie I can’t expect to be the quickest of everyone straightaway, so it’s about building it up and that’s our focus going forward. And as you can see, luck can play a big role, so all you can focus on is putting yourself up there, which is what we have done this year.”

Aron added that the environment at Hitech was positive. “I’m just having fun and I think that’s what this is about.”

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency