Andrea Kimi Antonelli took his first Formula 2 feature race win with a stunning drive at the Hungaroring on Sunday. After the race, Feeder Series spoke to the Mercedes F1 hopeful alongside selected media at a press conference.

By Martin Lloyd

Antonelli has been made to wait for this feature race victory. He did win the sprint race comfortably at Silverstone, but this came with the caveat of starting from reverse-grid pole. In Hungary, he was initially disadvantaged by a safety car before benefitting from the timing of a second. While he profited from being the highest runner on new tyres after that second safety car, his impressive opening stint had earned him that position. Antonelli told Feeder Series that the pressure has lifted since his Silverstone win.

“Definitely, from Silverstone, I feel way lighter! [There is] quite a bit less pressure on my shoulders. I think the pressure was building up weekend by weekend obviously with all the talking. Silverstone was a big relief for me.”

Drama ensued before the race began, as championship leader Isack Hadjar did not leave the pits for the grid in the allotted time period. This led to an empty space where the Frenchman should have started in third, allowing his fellow Frenchman Victor Martins to catapult into the lead from fifth on the grid. Polesitter Paul Aron locked up heavily at the start and fell to seventh, behind drivers including Zane Maloney, Antonelli and Dennis Hauger.

Aron was attempting to recover positions when he moved to the inside to pass Hauger on Lap 7. However, the Estonian misjudged his braking point and hit Maloney, pitching both into a spin and eliminating them. Antonelli narrowly avoided being hit by Aron, having just passed Maloney on the previous lap with an audacious move into Turn 9. The pair battled in the following corners as the circuit twists and turns its way through the middle sector; Antonelli was on top by the exit of Turn 11.

The safety car resulting from Aron’s incident hurt Antonelli – he had started on hards, and all those on softs were able to make their mandatory stop for new tyres. This elevated him to a temporary race lead, with Martins the highest-placed driver who had pitted, but Antonelli was due to fall behind all the newly hard-shod runners when he made his pitstop. However, he knew that another safety car later in the race could present him with a golden opportunity – and so it proved.

Amaury Cordeel crashed at Turn 4 on Lap 22, with an intervention inevitable. Antonelli pitted, and when the safety car peeled in, Antonelli was in fifth position on new softs with all ahead of him on ageing hard tyres. He quickly scythed through the field, taking the lead and winning the race by an eventual margin of 12.5 seconds.

After the race, Antonelli explained to Feeder Series that his Silverstone win has allowed him to drive with a more relaxed mindset, resulting in further success.

“I think this weekend I was driving like I was racing more freely than in the previous weekends. I was driving way more naturally without really thinking about the outcome, just focusing on myself. I think it really showed, and obviously this win, feature race and in the dry, is a big relief and a big result for all of us.”

Richard Verschoor, another on soft tyres by the end of the race, finished third, providing some comfort after the Dutchman lost his sprint race win to a technical infringement. Gabriel Bortoleto gained important points by finishing fourth; he is now third in the drivers’ standings, having overtaken the non-scoring Maloney. With Aron and the 18th-placed Hadjar also failing to score, Bortoleto is now firmly in the championship conversation – he lies just 30 points behind leader Hadjar.

Enzo Fittipaldi was fifth, ahead of Hauger and the seventh-placed Kush Maini, the winner of Saturday’s sprint race. Ritomo Miyata finished eighth, with Taylor Barnard and Rafael Villagómez rounding out the points-paying positions. 

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency