Trident’s Rafael Câmara was the class of the Formula 3 field in Bahrain on Sunday, taking his second feature race win of the season in dominant fashion with a 6.2-second gap over Callum Voisin.

By Daniele Spadi

Despite the healthy advantage with which Câmara crossed the finish line, the first part of the race was far from easy for him. The 19-year-old Ferrari junior started from pole but lost the lead to Rodin Motorsport’s Voisin entering Turn 1.

The Briton held it early on save for a few corners on lap three, when Câmara got through into Turn 1 but was re-passed at Turn 4. The Trident driver then retook the lead for the final time two laps later after a brief virtual safety car intervention, making the move stick up the inside into the opening corner.

From that moment on, Câmara unlocked the full potential of his car, never looking back and charging to his second win of the season. Voisin comfortably held second throughout the rest of the race.

The fight for other spots inside the top ten was what lit up the Bahrain International Circuit on Sunday. Charlie Wurz held his starting position of third throughout the opening laps before sprint race podium finisher Tuukka Taponen overtook him at Turn 1 on lap seven.

Behind them, there were two Red Bull juniors making up ground efficiently and waiting to pounce. Having started 13th, MP Motorsport’s Tim Tramnitz showed the same pace that enabled him to finish sixth in Saturday’s sprint, rising to sixth by the middle of lap eight after passing Christian Ho, who started fourth, at Turn 4. That corner was a prime hunting ground for both the German driver as well as yesterday’s winner Nikola Tsolov, who followed suit by taking seventh there on the following lap.

Tramnitz and Tsolov then focused on catching up to the top five, dispatching Noah Strømsted at Turn 4 on lap 12 and 13 respectively before setting their sights on Wurz and Taponen, who were still battling. Tramnitz was the first to strike, overtaking the Austrian around the outside of Turn 4 on lap 17. Not satisfied yet, the German then got the better of Taponen at the same spot two laps later, with Campos Racing’s Tsolov getting past Wurz at Turn 1 on the same lap too.

The Austrian seemed to struggle more than his rivals in the final stages of the race. His teammate Strømsted was able to take sixth from him down the start-finish straight on the penultimate lap, with MP’s Alessandro Giusti following suit around the outside of Turn 4.

While the other two Tridents battled, Câmara extended his gap over the rest of the field and crossed the line with a 6.2s advantage. With second feature win from pole in as many attempts and another fastest lap of the race to boot, the Brazilian heads into Imola with a 26-point advantage over Tramnitz. He also achieved what his countryman Gabriel Bortoleto did in his title-winning campaign two years ago by winning the opening two F3 feature races for Trident as a rookie.

Though Tramnitz seemed to have the pace to threaten Voisin, he had to settle for third position in what he described after the race as “one of the best performances of [his] life”. In the fight for fourth, Taponen fended off Tsolov by less than four tenths.

Strømsted held on to sixth ahead of Giusti, with Mari Boya recovering to eighth thanks to a fantastic double overtake on Wurz and Ho exiting Turn 3 on the final lap of the race. The Spaniard celebrated his 21st birthday in style with a recovery drive to the points from 20th on the grid.

Bruno Del Pino also passed Wurz at the next corner and stole ninth from Ho at the final corner. The Spaniard crossed the line just 0.072s of the DAMS driver as Wurz dropped out of the points to 11th. 

F3 debutant Freddie Slater, who finished second yesterday, made contact with Giusti at Turn 14 on the opening lap and pitted a lap later with terminal damage. He was the race’s only retirement.

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency