Daruvala leads Carlin 1-2 on opening day of F2 test
Jehan Daruvala has topped the timesheet on the opening day of the Formula 2 post-season Bahrain test ahead of Dan Ticktum in the sister Carlin car.
Fresh from securing his maiden F2 win in the 2020 season finale around the Bahrain outer loop circuit, the Indian driver jumped to the head of the times with 50 minutes to go on the opening day of the three-day test, before lowering his own benchmark with a 1m41.848s.
Ticktum, who is set to join the Carlin F2 line-up for 2021, slotted into second place on the timesheet late on just 0.106s off Daruvala's best laptime, to push Louis Deletraz into third place for MP Motorsport.
The day's testing action was delayed for over four hours from its scheduled start time at the request of the Bahrain International Circuit, which needed "all the appropriate marshalling and safety support in place" before it permitted track action around the circuit's grand prix layout which was used for the penultimate round of this year's F2 campaign.
That meant the day's schedule was shuffled into a five-hour single session of track running that started at 1:30pm local time.
FIA Formula 3 champion Oscar Piastri was the early pace-setter for Prema, having joined the team's F2 driver line-up for 2021 to replace F2 champion Mick Schumacher, with the Renault F1 junior eventually shuffled down to fifth place overall with Prema teammate Robert Shwartzman taking fourth place and just 0.002s off Deletraz's best effort.
Callum Ilott claimed sixth place, the 2020 F2 runner-up only in action for the first day of the test for Charouz Racing System before handing over to David Beckmann with Guilherme Samaia stepping into the sister car, with the Ferrari Academy driver heading to Abu Dhabi to take part in next week's F1 young driver test for Alfa Romeo.
F2 returnee Ralph Boschung ended the opening day seventh fastest for Campos Racing ahead of UNI-Virtuosi pair Guanyu Zhou and Felipe Drugovich, as Christian Lundgaard completed the top 10 for ART Grand Prix.
F2 will continue its post-season test in Bahrain on Wednesday and Thursday.
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