Red Bull Ring F3: Red Bull junior Vips ends Prema win streak
Red Bull Formula 1 junior Juri Vips scored a first FIA Formula 3 victory of the season with a measured drive from third on the grid in Austria for Hitech Grand Prix.
Vips dived into the lead at Turn 3 while Max Fewtrell passed Marcus Armstrong to retake the second place he had started on the fifth lap of 24.
Vips was unable to scamper clear, running an excruciating 0.8-0.9s clear of ART Grand Prix’s Fewtrell, just short of breaking the tow from DRS.
Ferrari junior and Prema driver Armstrong had proffered the race could be like the Indy 500, with three DRS zones to encourage overtaking, yet in reality after the order settled in the first few laps, the top nine remained largely the same.
Armstrong had to defend from his teammate Jehan Daruvala with just under 10 laps to go after locking up at Turn 3 attempting a move on Fewtrell, and then Daruvala attacked at Turn 4 on the last lap but Armstrong eased his teammate wide to secure the position to the end.
Vips took his first race win of the season - and the first for a non-Prema driver - with a 1.7s gap after Fewtrell came under attack on the last lap from the duelling Premas.
The top four escaped with five laps to go as Trident Racing’s Pedro Piquet pressured Jake Hughes’s HWA-prepared car.
Piquet made a move stick with two laps to go at Turn 3, but Hughes retook the place at Turn 4 on the same lap.
Their duel allowed points’ leader Robert Shwartzman into the battle and he passed them both in the remaining laps to seal fifth after a technical issue in qualifying meant he had to start from ninth.
Piquet stole fifth from Hughes at the last, the latter seemingly struggling with a mechanical issue.
Also on the last lap, reigning German F4 champion Lirim Zendeli made up for ill health at Paul Ricard by steering his Sauber Junior Team-run car past Leo Pulcini for eighth on the last lap.
Richard Verschoor got into and then fell back out of the top 10 on numerous occasions, but ultimately secured the position ahead of Trident’s Niko Kari.
Race results
Cla | # | Driver | Team | Time |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 21 | Jüri Vips | HitechGP | |
2 | 2 | Max Fewtrell | ART Grand Prix | 1.7 |
3 | 26 | Marcus Armstrong | Prema Powerteam | 2.3 |
4 | 27 | Jehan Daruvala | Prema Powerteam | 3.6 |
5 | 28 | Robert Shwartzman | Prema Powerteam | 5.6 |
6 | 18 | Pedro Piquet | Trident | 7.4 |
7 | 11 | Jake Hughes | HWA AG | 8.4 |
8 | 7 | Lirim Zendeli | Charouz Racing System | 8.9 |
9 | 20 | Leonardo Pulcini | HitechGP | 9.4 |
10 | 6 | Richard Verschoor | MP Motorsport | 13.2 |
View full results |
Be part of Motorsport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Top Comments
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.