PREMA, Vesti claim first Feature Race win of 2023

PREMA Racing and Frederik Vesti secured their first FIA Formula 2 Championship wins of the season today at Jeddah Corniche Circuit. The 21-year-old Danish driver put up a monumental performance in the Feature Race at the Saudi street venue.

Vesti, a Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team Junior Driver, started from the third row and quickly broke into the top-5, before pulling a neat move to fourth place. A great in-lap and a swift pit-stop handed him the third place, and another move on his teammate Ollie Bearman brought up to P2.

Fighting for P1, he pushed his main contender as hard as possible and collected the dividends, taking the lead and powering away. When the cars on the reverse strategy stopped, he was untouchable and secured the win.

Moving away from the Front Row, rookie Ollie Bearman had an equally quick start and gained the lead. He defended it efficiently throughout the pit-stop phase but a spin sent him chasing and the damage to the tyres meant that he couldn’t do better than P10, still posting his maiden points finish in a tough weekend for rookies.

7 FREDERIK VESTI

“I just have Monza 2020 feelings at the moment, it was a huge win then and it’s a huge result today together with PREMA and Pedro, my engineer, Mercedes and everyone who is supporting me. The race was eventful. I tried to stay out of trouble while a lot of people were making mistakes in front of me, which obviously helped but we had a great pace as well and put pressure on Martins, who was the fastest in qualifying. To do that and win is a massive result. We cannot wait to go again in Melbourne soon.”

Qualifying: P7
Starting position Race 1: P9
Starting position Race 2: P6
Fastest Lap: 1:42.295
Race 1: P6
Race 2: P1

8 OLLIE BEARMAN

“I made a good start and managed to jump into the lead. In the first stint, I was fairly happy, and the guys made a good pit-stop as well so I got back on track in the lead. At that stage, I wasn’t as fast as the two guys behind me so they ended up passing. My pace stabilized and it was quite OK but unfortunately, I lost the car in turn 22. From then, my tyres were damaged and that compromised my race. The potential was, there, just a mistake on my side which compromised the result. Sorry for the team, we’ll try to bounce back in Melbourne.”

Qualifying: P2
Starting position Race 1: P8
Starting position Race 2: P2
Fastest Lap: 1:42.070
Race 1: DNF
Race 2: P10

Source | Photo: PREMA Racing