This week SLR F2 heads to fantastic little street circuit in Azerbaijan for round 6 of season 7, Qualifying saw SLR Corey take a 12th pole in SLR F2 and a 5th of the season, Griffiths in the MP would be alongside him and 2nd place man in the championship Ham in P3. Standout performance for Semm who would put his Virtuosi in P5!
The sprint would begin with everyone scrambling for position in the opening corners, Bennett and Para would getaway well from the front row but heading down into T3 the two championship protagonists would come together for a second week in a row! (Sorry Ham ☹) Para would begin to take off out in front with the Hitech of Bennett unable to keep up with the Prema, with car after car passing him. A safety car would be deployed after Semm crashing into the barrier at the final corner after losing his front wing would close the pack back up with a 2-lap sprint to the end and a few drivers choosing to pit for the super softs behind the SC. Para would get us back underway, but Griffiths and Corey wouldn’t be far behind both chasing him down for the win. Heartbreak for Bennett as hardware issues would see him spin round unfortunately taking SLR Medal with him in the process. But going into the final lap the top 3 going 3 wide into T1 would obviously not go well with Griffiths losing out in the progress and Corey going from 3rd to 1st. Corey would take the chequered flag to win the sprint with Para holding onto 2nd and the ever-consistent Grandad… I mean SLR Southerner picking up the final podium position. SLR Ham brilliantly recovered to 5th after that contact o the opening lap. EO31 Echo also picking up points on his SLR F2 debut aswell. But one thing that cannot be overlooked is BaggieFan picking up his first official F2 points since season 5 after finishing P8 with a mega drive! Proud of you old man x
The feature would see a mix of strategy with the threat of safety cars ever large at this street circuit we would see the top 2 of Corey and Ham opt for the supersoft start but Griffiths in P3 going for the alternate strategy on the mediums. Corey would get a great getaway but Griffiths with the best of the lot, getting past Ham into T1 and doing Corey a massive favour holding him up (thanks Toby, I’ll buy you a fruit shoot at the end of the season 😉) Ham would finally get past Griffiths once DRS was enabled but was it too late for the Carlin driver as he would see his championship rival over 6 seconds clear? Ham would opt to pit early to hope he could potentially gain ground on Corey, but he would come out in traffic losing him time if anything. Corey would then pit a few laps later out in fresh air hoping to claim a double in Baku. Shoutout to OwenHowell as he was making fantastic ground as he was running in the points after starting at the back of the grid. But for one last time in Baku Corey would cross the line to complete the Baku double by winning the feature race by an impressive 19 seconds over championship rival Ham with UKBeastAssassin returning to the podium for Van Amersfoort, Southerner once again in P4 picking up the pieces as he usually has done this season and SLR Medal finishes P5 making up for the incident he was involved in the sprint race. A great drive for OwenHowell as well as he crossed the line to finish P9, a great weekend for the majority of our evo drivers.
Corey extends his championship lead to 55 points over Ham with Southerner moving back up to 3rd after his great results. Virtuosi close up to Carlin at the top of the constructors championship. A week off next week for us and the following week we head to Le Castellet in France where last season showed us how great the racing can be there.
Blogs driver of the round – BaggieFan: After a full season without official points Baggie returned to the points this weekend, staying out of trouble in the sprint and picking up P8 and hopefully more to come from the VAR driver in the future.
Qualifying:
1. SLR Corey 1:47.954
2. SLR Ham19
3. BRT Griffiths
4. UKBeastAssassin
5. SemmF1
6. SLR Medal
7. SLR Southerner
8. F1ABQW3RTYYY
9. SLR Bennett3810
10. Para Quickz
11. SLR Dodgy
12. J Lee Menz
13. SLR Allen
14. EO31ECHO
15. BaggieFan1995
16. SLR EVVO
17. OwenHowell36
Sprint Race:
1. Para Quickz
2. SLR Southerner
3. J Lee Menz
4. SLR Ham19
5. EO31ECHO
6. SLR Dodgy
7. SLR Corey 10s + 2LP
8. BaggieFan 1995
9. SLR Medal2533
10. BRT Griffiths 1:51.355
11. UKBeastAssassin
12. SLR Bennett3810
13. SLR Allen
14. F1ABQW3RTYYY DNF 2LP + QB *
15. SemmF1 DNF
16. OwenHowell36 DNF
17. SLR EVVO DNF
Sprint
SLR Ham19 vs SLR Corey Lap 1 - Sprint Verdict: 10 second and 2 LP to SLR Corey SLR Corey outbrakes himself hitting into the rear of SLR Ham19 causing the collision.
SLR Southerner vs F1ABQwerty Lap 2 - Sprint Verdict 10 second and 2 LP to F1ABQwerty F1ABQwerty is never going to make that corner and has caused a collision with SLR Southerner forcing him into a half spin.
*With F1ABQW3RTYY retiring this means the 10s + 2LP awarded is converted to a Qualifying ban for the following round with the 2LP still given
Feature Race:
1. SLR Corey 1:50.453
2. SLR Ham19
3. UKBeastAssassin
4. SLR Southerner
5. SLR Medal2533
6. SLR Bennett3810
7. BRT Griffiths
8. Para Quickz
9. OwenHowell36
10. J Lee Menz
11. F1ABQW3RTYYY
12. SLR Dodgy
13. EO31ECHO
14. BaggieFan 1995
15. SLR EVVO DNF 2LP *
16. SemmF1 DNF
17. SLR Allen DNF
Feature
EO31Echo vs J Lee Menz Lap 1 - Feature Verdict: Racing Incident EO13Echo has understeered/goes deep into the corner himself and into side of SLR Allen and is already going into a sort of spin and has slowed down massively then gets tapped by J Lee Menz nothing else he could have done, Lap 1 incident.
OwenHowell36 vs SLR EVVO Lap 11 - Feature Verdict: 5 second and 1 LP to SLR EVVO SLR EVVO taps the rear of OwenHowell36 car sending him into a spin.
*Due to SLR EVVO retiring this means the 5s + 1LP awarded is now changed to 2LP.
Comments