The Brazilian started in sixth, led most of the race and finished in second
On Sunday (31), the Bahrain International Circuit in the Middle East hosted the second stage of the F2 World Championship. Racing for the French team DAMS, the Brazilian driver Sérgio Sette Câmara (YOUSE | Banco BMG | CCR | MRV | CEMIG | GASMIG | CBMM | COPASA), the only driver from Brasil in the category, had another great performance and finished the day again on the podium, in the second position.
Sérgio started from the sixth position according to the reversed positions of Saturday’s race finishing order. He was very focused and knew that, just as in yesterday’s race, he would need to do an intelligent and bold race to gain positions.
After a good start, the racer jumped to fifth in the first corner and, in turn three, he was in a strategic position avoiding a cluster of cars just ahead of him. At the end of the first lap, he was already in the second position, having in front of him only Mick Schumacher, who couldn’t follow Sergio’s fast pace and was overtaken shortly. Sergio completed lap 2 in the first place.
Sérgio led the race until on the fourth lap when he was overtaken by Luca Ghiotto returning to second place. Latiffi tried to attack him but, Sergio defended well and both began to take a stance of saving the tyres a little since in the Sprint Race the pit stop is not mandatory.
With 13 laps completed, out of a total of 23, Ghiotto had already opened more than six seconds in the lead and, to everyone’s surprise, went to the pits. Sérgio took the lead and was 19 seconds ahead of the Italian driver when he returned to the track.
From there, the Brazilian was forced to accelerate to the maximum not to be reached by the competitor who appeared in the seventh place. It turns out, however, that Ghiotto was about three seconds faster every lap with new tyres. Two laps to the end, Ghiotto overtook Sergio to take the lead and win the race. Sergio completed the race in second and Latiffi in third.
After the first two stages of the F2 World Championship Luca Ghiotto leads the standings with 37 points against Latiffi with 35 in second and Sette Camera with 27 in third. The F2 World Championship resumes its schedule in four weeks from 26-28 April for the Azerbaijan GP on the Baku city street circuit.
“I’m happy for the second place in today’s race, but certainly a little disappointed not to have won the race. We knew about the high tyre wear in this track, but we decided to define if we would stop to pit during the race. At that moment, we analyzed the scenario and we decided not to stop since the risk of returning in the middle of the group was also very considerable. We talked about pitting eight laps to the end, but we would certainly not have time to recover. I leave here satisfied, with 27 points in my luggage and the certainty that we have a fast and reliable car,” commented the 20-year-old.