F2 Pre-Season Testing: Zane Maloney Dominates the Final Day
Review of three days of pre-season testing in Bahrain, which notably saw impressive performances from Zane Maloney, who dominated the last two days, and the debut of young Andrea Kimi Antonelli at Prema.
Formula 2 enters a new era this year with the introduction of a brand-new race car. After an intensive development and shakedown program, the 22 cars hit the track together for the first time during these pre-season tests.
The F2 paddock has been in Bahrain for three days as part of the official pre-season testing before the start of the season on the weekend of March 2nd, in support of the Bahrain Grand Prix of Formula 1. Let’s look back on three days of testing that just concluded this Tuesday, February 13th.
To know before the start of the season.
22 drivers are getting ready to compete on 14 different tracks this season in F2. Twelve “veterans” are joined by 10 rookies for the upcoming season, with 17 different nationalities represented on the grid, including two French drivers: Victor Martins and Isack Hadjar.
The first, a member of the Alpine Academy, will continue with ART GP after finishing the 2023 season as the best rookie. Victor Martins is joined this season by Zak O’Sullivan, who finished as runner-up in Formula 3 last season, and who replaces Théo Pourchaire, the outgoing champion.
The second Frenchman, Isack Hadjar, will be lined up at Campos, after a mediocre first season at Hitech in 2023. The Red Bull Junior Team member will have everything to prove as Formula 1 seats could become available higher up in the Red Bull hierarchy.
ART GP’s rivals for the title will be, as usual, Prema, one of the most successful teams in F2. This season, the Italian team will field Oliver Bearman and Andrea Kimi Antonelli, a rising star from the Mercedes academy who will skip the Formula 3 step after winning the Formula Regional European championship.
The F3 champion in 2023, Gabriel Bortoleto, is moving up the ranks and joining the F2 grid with Invicta. The Brazilian driver has just been freshly appointed as a member of McLaren’s development and young driver program.
Sunday: Dennis Hauger the fastest in pouring rain.
And yes, even in Bahrain, it can rain! For their first official session on track, the 2024 Formula 2 cars faced the rain at Sakhir. The drivers didn’t cover many laps, and it was ultimately Denis Hauger who finished the rainy day at the top of the timesheet, with a time of 1:53.175 set by the Norwegian driver from MP Motorsport.
On the French side, Victor Martins set the third fastest time of the session, less than two-tenths behind the leader, while Isack Hadjar finished the day in thirteenth position, almost one and a half seconds behind the leader.
In the rain, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, the rookie who is causing a sensation and even making headlines as a possible replacement for Lewis Hamilton, had a very impressive first day. He finished in fourth place on the time sheet, just three tenths behind the leader, and also completed the most laps of the session: 24.
Monday: Zane Maloney took the lead at the end of the day.
On a more conventional weather day in Bahrain’s second day of testing, it was Zane Maloney who set the fastest lap. The driver from Rodin Motorsport, who has recently joined the Sauber Academy and become a reserve driver at Stake F1, took the lead in the last hour of the session, with a time of 1:41.501.
The French drivers Isack Hadjar and Victor Martins finished respectively in fourth and eighth position, more than four and six tenths of a second behind the Barbadian leader. The Prema drivers showed themselves to be more withdrawn, likely to carry out various tests: Bearman and Antonelli ended the Monday session in twentieth and twenty-first places, two and three seconds behind the leader.
The rookie Gabriel Bortoleto concluded the day with the most laps completed: 71, which is a little over two main races.
Tuesday: Maloney repeats and finishes the trials in first place.
Zane Maloney continued to set the pace on the final day of pre-season testing in Sakhir. The Rodin Motorsport driver posted a time of 1:42.468 towards the end of the session to top the time sheets.
Earlier in the day, it was French driver Isack Hadjar who was leading a Campos one-two ahead of his teammate Josep María Martí. Hadjar ultimately finishes the day in fourth place, while Martins is twentieth.
Positions, however, don’t mean much considering the gaps and the different testing programs that the drivers implement. The pleasant surprise of this last day comes from the Japanese rookie Ritomo Miyata, teammate of Maloney at Rodin, who comes straight from Super Formula and finishes the day in third position.
The day was more productive for all the drivers, and the Belgian Amaury Cordeel finished the day with 97 laps completed.
The Formula 2 paddock will now meet for the first round of the season in Bahrain, supporting the Formula 1 Grand Prix, from February 29th to March 2nd.
