Slater is unstoppable at Vallelunga
Alex Powell returns to the podium, Yamakoshi secures another P3
Vallelunga - Race 2 of the Italian F.4 Championship took place in the morning at the Piero Taruffi Circuit in Vallelunga, starting at 9:00. After 30 minutes + 1 lap, Freddie Slater emerged victorious once again. This morning, the British driver from Prema Racing started from pole position and led an impeccable race, crossing the finish line with over a 5-second lead on the second position, with the advantage accumulated through a series of fastest laps. Slater now has 50 points from the third round, bringing his total to 140, leading the standings. Following the misfortunes of Race 1, where he broke his front wing in a tough battle with teammate Gowda, Alex Powell returned to the podium today. The Mercedes Junior driver from Prema Racing maintained his P2 from qualifying, defending his position without taking risks from occasional attacks from behind. The Jamaican also secured victory in the Rookie class. Hiyu Yamakoshi from Van Amersfoort Racing finished in third position once again, replicating yesterday’s result and continuing to position himself as Slater's main rival in the standings, with 112 points accumulated so far.
Fourth, just shy of the overall podium, was Tomass Stolcermanis. The Latvian driver from Prema Racing secured P2 in the Rookie class with this result, continuing to lead the Rookie standings with 143 points. A great race for the fifth-place finisher, Brazilian Matheus Ferreira, the top representative in the race of the German Team US Racing. Sixth place went to Swiss driver Ethan Ischer from Team Jenzer Motorsport, redeeming a weekend in which he had excellent pace, marred by an incident in Race 1. The Swiss driver gained a position at the expense of Akshay Bohra, the Indo-American driver from US Racing, who finished just behind. Eighth place in the second race of the weekend went to another driver from the Team of Gerhard Ungar and Ralf Schumacher, Australian Gianmarco Pradel. Pradel gained the position with a spectacular inside overtaking maneuver on Prema's Indian driver Dion Gowda, who finished ninth. Closing out the top 10, earning the last point at stake, was Swedish driver Gustav Jonsson from Van Amersfoort Racing.
Spectacle and twists were once again the key factors in the Italian F.4 Championship race at Vallelunga. After Slater made a perfect start when the lights went out, the battle raged behind him. Stolcermanis attacked Yamakoshi for the podium but could not find space for a move, and chose to avoid excessive risks. The group fight became intense from the first lap, with a three-car collision involving Oleksandr Savinkov (AKM Motorsport), Andrija Kostic (Van Amersfoort Racing), and Everett Stack (PHM AIX Racing), all ending up parked in the gravel. On the first lap, there was also contact between Van Amersfoort Racing's Italian driver Alvise Rodella and Real Racing's Romanian driver Luca Viisoreanu, resulting in a 10-second penalty for Rodella. A restart ensued, which did not pose a problem for Slater. Action resumed in the pack, with Maxim Rehm from US Racing making a brilliant pass on his Alpine Academy teammate Kabir Anurag to take P17. Later, Rehm was involved in a fierce battle with several cars, causing Prema Racing’s Emirati driver Rashid Al Dhaheri to break his front wing, forcing a pit stop. Jonsson entered the points zone with a masterful pass on R-ace GP’s Luka Sammalisto. The Finnish driver, who had been very fast throughout the Vallelunga weekend, had a disappointing end to Race-2 after being hit by Jack Beeton. The Australian US Racing driver, who finished twelfth after a P2 in Race 1, received a post-race penalty of 10 seconds for the incident. In the final stages of the race, Japanese driver Nakamura Berta tried to take P10 from Jonsson but couldn’t find the space to attempt a maneuver. His car then made contact with Beeton’s, who was alongside him in an intense battle. Despite the contact, both managed to finish the race.
All races of the weekend are run over 30 minutes + 1 lap and are broadcast live on the Italian F.4 Championship's YouTube and Facebook channels, on ACI Sport TV (Sky channel 228, Tivù Sat channel 52, and streaming on www.acisport.it), as well as on the extensive network of international broadcasters covering the Italian F4 Championship 2024, including the DAZN platform.
Freddie Slater: “to be fair the car just felt unreal. In this colder condition in the morning, the car felt lighter, this is the favorite time to race for me. The drivers enjoy it, it’s the best to race in, the tyres never really go off, and you just always pushing, lap after lap. It’s good fun, and I really enjoyed that one. The pace is good, Prema gave me an amazing car, and I just had to do my job and put it together, and that’s what I did. We are focused on race right now.”
Alex Powell: “it was a good race in general. It has been a tough run of races up until now. I’m happy to be back on the podium, and sort of to get the season restarted. Unfortunate for the incident yesterday, but anyway we moved on. Today we had a good starting position, we were able to capitalize a bit on the race. It was a bit tough with race pace, and so on. I’m happy to be back on the podium, and I’m looking forward to Race-3 where I start in pole, so it's a good opportunity to continue this positive momentum and finish the weekend on a high. Here it’s really based off on the first two laps, on how you are able to position your car. If you are able to make a position in the first two laps, more than likely you stay there, because it’s quite difficult to overtake around here, since it’s so tight. More than anything, it’s just trying to take advantage of the race start, and try as far forward as possible. From there on, then you can manage the race. I’d say the most difficult part is overtaking, for sure.”
Hiyu Yamakoshi: “I made a mistake at the start, I almost lost a position. This is something I need to improve in Race-3. Overall, quite nice pace, I followed Powell, but he was a little bit too fast in the beginning and in the last few laps. I hadn’t chance to overtake when I was at the same lap time as Powell. I got a lot of experience today, and I think in Race-3 I can improve a bit more.”
Tomass Stolcermanis: “qualy 2 yesterday was quite ok, so I had a good position for this race, starting P4. I think the only chance where I could overtake was the first 2 laps. I didn’t do that. All the way for the next laps, it was just understeer everywhere and was very difficult to overtake. This track it’s quite similar to Imola.”
Kean Nakamura Berta: “in qualy we couldn’t find the perfect balance. That put us on the back for the whole weekend, and it’s not ideal. On this track is difficult to overtake after the first two laps. Once everyone is in like a train, it’s just too much dirty air and too much understeer. I made 4 positions up in the race; there were a few crashes, which I try to avoid and costed me some positions. Overall, it wasn’t a bad race, I think we still got a bit more to do, but we are heading in the right direction, and I’ll just try to do my best in Race-3.”