Mick schumacher has kept his nerve in the formula 2 title race and heads into the decisive kilometers of the season with a lead over his closest rival callum ilott.
While ilott ended up at the back of the field with no payers after an unfortunate crash and a drive-through penalty in sunday’s sprint race in bahrain, schumacher still scored two points in seventh place.
The son of formula 1 record world champion michael schumacher has a total of 205 points on his tally before the last two races of the formula 2 year – also in sakhir. Ilott of the uni-virtuosi team has 14 fewer payers. At the season finale, schumacher thus not only clinched the longed-for formula 1 promotion but also the title in the most important junior series.
"That was a pretty turbulent race with seventh place. The positive aspect is that I’m still in the lead, so I’m really looking forward to the last race weekend of the season," commented schumacher.
"I’m rooting for him," ferrari star sebastian vettel had said about mick schumacher. With a 22-point lead over ilott, the 21-year-old prema driver had come out of his two-month break from racing. In the qualifying for the main race, the briton took the pole and the first four times of the weekend, while the german junior star was only tenth.
In saturday’s 32-lap main race, schumacher, who is a strong candidate for a formula 1 cockpit with the U.S. Team haas in 2021, took further points despite an excellent start. In fourth place, he missed the podium, while ilott came second.
Strong nerves were needed in the sprint race over just 23 laps on sunday. Schumacher not only had to endure tough duels with the russian nikita mazepin, who was also traded by haas, and christian lundgaard from denmark. The german also had to stay out of a crash so as not to be left without points.
On the eighth lap the over-motivated ilott crashed into the carlin of jehan daruvala directly in front of schumacher. The prema pilot was just able to maneuver around the scene of the accident. Ilott, meanwhile, demolished the front of his car and was also given a drive-through penalty – in the end only 16th place for him.
Schumacher wants to stay at the top of the formula 2 standings after the coming weekend. In this case, he was included in an illustrious circle: already charles leclerc (2017) and lewis hamilton (2006) secured titles in the racing series. The last german champion in the junior class was nico hulkenberg in 2009.