Spa-Francorchamps hosted the fifth round of Formula 2 within the last six weeks – and the weekend produced chaotic weather conditions, superb on-track racing, and yet another victory for Campos Racing’s Isack Hadjar.

By Steven Walton

Hadjar extends his advantage

With his fourth feature race victory of the season, Hadjar has moved into a commanding position in the F2 standings. He is now 36 points ahead of Gabriel Bortoleto and 41 points clear of Paul Aron.

This margin is significant because it gives Hadjar breathing room with four rounds still to go this year. The maximum number of points one driver can score at a single round is 39, but that requires pole position and winning both races with the fastest laps.

Given his 36-point championship advantage, the only scenario where Hadjar won’t lead the championship after the next round in Monza is if Bortoleto scores maximum points while he fails to get any.

It is an unlikely situation at best, given that Hadjar has been clinical this year during the high points-paying feature races. 

He has won four out of ten feature races and should have had a fifth win in Monaco, but settled for second when Zak O’Sullivan pulled off a “1 in 1000 chance” victory. 

Hadjar didn’t score points in three feature races – Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Hungary – but that was because of issues outside his control. Take those three races out and Hadjar’s feature race results read like this: 1st, 1st, 2nd, 5th, 3rd, 1st, and 1st.

Bortoleto truly joins the championship fight

Belgium should be regarded as the round that truly brought Invicta Racing’s Gabriel Bortoleto into this year’s championship fight.

Since Monaco, Aron and Hadjar have occupied the top two spots in the championship, but Aron’s poor run of form in the last three rounds has now seen him shuffled down to third and Bortoleto promoted to second.

Bortoleto has been playing catch-up in the championship for much of 2024. After the first three rounds, he was only sitting 12th.

But since racing in Europe, Bortoleto has hauled himself back into contention. He had particularly strong weekends in Imola, where he earned pole position, and Spielberg, where he picked up his maiden F2 victory.

In the Belgium feature race, Bortoleto was back on the podium after finishing second behind Hadjar.

Crucially, Bortoleto put Hadjar under pressure in the race’s second stint – hopefully a sign that Bortoleto can take the fight to the championship leader in the next four rounds.

Reliability problems continue to influence the championship

In Belgium, it was Paul Aron’s turn to feel the stinging heartbreak of reliability, something which affected his championship rivals earlier this year.

The Hitech driver ran third heading into the final lap of the feature race but stopped on track in the first sector with an apparent problem. 

This cost Aron a podium and 15 valuable points in the championship fight. He now leaves Belgium with a 41-point gap to championship leader Hadjar instead of a 26-point gap if he had finished third.

This was Aron’s second reliability-related retirement of the year, though championship rivals Hadjar and Bortoleto have also retired from two races each this season because of technical issues.

More brilliance from Antonelli

Mercedes junior Kimi Antonelli has undoubtedly raised his profile in recent rounds thanks to breakthrough wins in Silverstone and Hungary.

In Belgium, his results were not overly spectacular – sixth in the sprint and ninth in the feature – but Antonelli still made his mark on the weekend with a sublime overtake on Franco Colapinto at Eau Rouge.

In wet conditions that soon saw the race called off, Antonelli was fearless as he hugged the inside of the notoriously fast uphill section, pulling off an overtake that many other drivers would’ve backed out of.

Very rightfully, F2 described the overtake on its official X account as “one of the moves of the season so far”.

Not much goes right for Bearman or Martins

Ollie Bearman and Victor Martins have struggled to make an impact in this year’s championship – and this was on full display again in Belgium.

In qualifying, Martins stopped on track with an issue and was unable to set a lap time, leaving him to start both races from 22nd. Meanwhile, Bearman only qualified 15th – the sixth time this season he has failed to make it inside the top ten. Afterwards, he said: “We struggle to get the most out of the car, missing a little bit of confidence in it.”

In the feature race, Bearman was eliminated before turn one. He made contact with Zane Maloney while braking for the first corner, which spun Bearman hard into the side of Pepe Martí. The collision eliminated Bearman and Martí immediately.

The stewards ruled Bearman was to blame for causing the collision and handed him a five-place grid drop for his next race.

Martins was taken out of the feature race on lap four through no fault of his own. He had nowhere to go when he was hit by the spinning car of Rafael Villagómez at the Les Combes chicane.

Ultimately, Martins and Bearman both failed to score points in Belgium. They sit 12th and 15th in the championship, respectively.

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency