The Official 2017 Formula 2 Season Thread **Spoilers**
Discussion
The renamed GP2 is kicking off at the Bahrain GP this weekend, thought it'd be nice to have some chatter about that here. Not sure where to put this, but seeing as this is an F1 support series, I figured it stay here than the General Motorsport area.
Teams/drivers
Eleven rounds are scheduled coinciding with F1 race weekends (except Jerez substituting for Sepang):
Live timing is available here:
http://www.fiaformula2.com/Live-Timing/Live-Timing...
Prema Racing start as defending champions fielding Ferrari driver academy pupils and 2016 GP3 competitors Leclerc and Fuoco. Team to beat? The team boss doesn't think so.
The series has lost a couple of British talents to sports cars, but of King/Rowland, the latter is in a good place for this year. Will be looking to challenge for the title this year, I hope.
This is supposed to be the last year for the 4.0L N/A V8s with the series set to move to V6 turbos next year and a new chassis too.
Pirelli are not being consistent with F1 in supplying lower deg tyres for F2, and the high deg tyres from last year are set to remain.
There are question marks of the series being good enough value for competitors with F1 aspirations. In recent years, the general perception appears to have shifted in getting drivers straight into F1 from lower categories than GP2/F2. With F1 cars becoming harder to drive now, would there be a shift back to a more normal progression for single seater drivers?
Live TV coverage is only via Sky, sadly.
LOL@ the swear filter being triggered by the Honda protege!
Some rules for the uninitiated:
Teams/drivers
| Team (Country) | Drivers |
|---|---|
| Prema Racing (Italy) | Charles Leclerc, Antonio Fuoco |
| Racing Engineering (Spain) | Louis Delétraz, Gustav Malja |
| Russian Time (Russia) | Luca Ghiotto, Artem Markelov |
| ART Grand Prix (France) | Nobuharu Matsus ta, Alexander Albon |
| DAMS (France) | Oliver Rowland, Nicholas Latifi |
| Campos Racing (Spain) | Ralph Boschung, Stefano Coletti, Roberto Merhi |
| MP Motorsport (Netherlands) | Sérgio Sette Câmara, Jordan King |
| Trident (Italy) | Nabil Jeffri, Sergio Canamasas |
| Rapax (Italy) | Nyck de Vries, Johnny Cecotto Jr. |
| Pertamina Arden (UK) | Norman Nato, Sean Gelael |
Eleven rounds are scheduled coinciding with F1 race weekends (except Jerez substituting for Sepang):
| Date(s) | Circuit |
|---|---|
| 14-16 April | Sakhir, Bahrain |
| 12-14 May | Barcelona, Spain |
| 25-27 May | Monte Carlo, Monaco |
| 23-25 June | Baku, Azerbaijan |
| 07-09 July | Spielberg, Austria |
| 14-16 July | Silverstone, Great Britain |
| 28-30 July | Budapest, Hungary |
| 25-27 August | Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium |
| 01-03 September | Monza, Italy |
| 06-08 October | Jerez de la Frontera, Spain |
| 24-26 November | Yas Marina, UAE |
Live timing is available here:
http://www.fiaformula2.com/Live-Timing/Live-Timing...
Prema Racing start as defending champions fielding Ferrari driver academy pupils and 2016 GP3 competitors Leclerc and Fuoco. Team to beat? The team boss doesn't think so.
The series has lost a couple of British talents to sports cars, but of King/Rowland, the latter is in a good place for this year. Will be looking to challenge for the title this year, I hope.
This is supposed to be the last year for the 4.0L N/A V8s with the series set to move to V6 turbos next year and a new chassis too.
Pirelli are not being consistent with F1 in supplying lower deg tyres for F2, and the high deg tyres from last year are set to remain.
There are question marks of the series being good enough value for competitors with F1 aspirations. In recent years, the general perception appears to have shifted in getting drivers straight into F1 from lower categories than GP2/F2. With F1 cars becoming harder to drive now, would there be a shift back to a more normal progression for single seater drivers?
Live TV coverage is only via Sky, sadly.
LOL@ the swear filter being triggered by the Honda protege!
Some rules for the uninitiated:
F2 Rules said:
Every car will have five sets of dry tyres and three sets of wet weather tyres available for the race weekend.
The five sets of dry tyres comprise three sets of the [hard] compound and two sets of the [soft] compound. The drivers can use their tyre allocation in any way they like, but at least one set of each compound must be used in the feature race (unless it is a wet race). One set of the harder compound must be returned after free practice.
Qualifying takes place on Friday, after practice. The feature race on Saturday lasts 32 laps and each driver must complete one compulsory pit stop. This cannot take place within the first six laps. Unlike F1, the drivers do not have to start the race using the tyres they qualified on.
The grid for the sprint race on Sunday is determined by the finishing order of the first race, with the top eight positions reversed. It is run over 23 laps, with no compulsory pit stops.
Pole position scores 4 points and fastest lap scores 2 points per race. Top 10 finishers of the feature race score points as per the F1 system, with the top 8 finishers in the sprint scoring points (15, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2, 1).
The five sets of dry tyres comprise three sets of the [hard] compound and two sets of the [soft] compound. The drivers can use their tyre allocation in any way they like, but at least one set of each compound must be used in the feature race (unless it is a wet race). One set of the harder compound must be returned after free practice.
Qualifying takes place on Friday, after practice. The feature race on Saturday lasts 32 laps and each driver must complete one compulsory pit stop. This cannot take place within the first six laps. Unlike F1, the drivers do not have to start the race using the tyres they qualified on.
The grid for the sprint race on Sunday is determined by the finishing order of the first race, with the top eight positions reversed. It is run over 23 laps, with no compulsory pit stops.
Pole position scores 4 points and fastest lap scores 2 points per race. Top 10 finishers of the feature race score points as per the F1 system, with the top 8 finishers in the sprint scoring points (15, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2, 1).
Edited by Dr Z on Friday 12th May 12:29
)
Good teamwork on Leclerc winning the sprint (and quick learning from him too). I think the team quickly adapted the strategy playing to his strengths, seeing how he attacked at the start yesterday, and was not in a good position to defend from Markelov towards the end. Leclerc got pole for the feature race too, nice to see him continue to show his speed in F2.
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