Qatar – Sprint: Hadjar loses victory and misses opportunity to regain lead

Strange Sprint Race that Isack Hadjar (Campos) experienced this Saturday in Qatar. Second on the grid and strategically shifted (starting on medium tires), the Tricolore almost pulled off his coup.

Thanks to a faster rubber, the protégé of Red Bull took the lead of the race from the second lap and quickly opened up a gap to Oliver Bearman (Prema), who started on hard tyres. Unfortunately, the drop in performance cost him dearly at the end of the race when the Englishman managed to get back in his wake and launched a successful attack at the start of lap 21.

Having set out to secure second place, which would have given him the lead in the championship, Isack Hadjar lost control of his car at turn 4 and spun. A mishap that caused him to fall to 4th place. On the radio, the Parisian apologized to his team for his “light” defense when he hadn’t realized that there were only three laps left.

The intervention of the Safety Car for the last two laps after the collision between Kush Maini (Invicta Racing) and Andrea Kimi Antonelli (Prema) froze the positions. Thus, Oliver Bearman took his third victory of the season (all in a Sprint) ahead of Jak Crawford (DAMS) and Richard Verschoor (MP Motorsport).

Fourth under the checkered flag, Isack Hadjar took back 2 points from the championship leader Gabriel Bortoleto (6th) to come back to 2,5 lengths.

Victor Martins (ART Grand Prix), also starting on medium tyres, had long been in contention for a podium finish but his severe deterioration caused him to fall down the rankings, finishing 10th.

The Main Race is scheduled for 13:20 a.m. this Sunday.

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