Theo Pourchaire dominated 2021 Monaco Feature Race to become Formula Two’s youngest-ever race winner.
Pourchaire completed a lights to flag victory having lost the lead for just seven laps after his pit stop on lap 31, surviving three late Virtual Safety Car incidents to win by 2.894 seconds and become F2’s youngest-ever race winner at 17 years, nine months and three days old.
Oscar Piastri finished second like he did this morning after Liam Lawson’s disqualification, this time benefitting from a slow pit stop for his PREMA teammate Robert Shwartzman who finished fourth and avoiding a penalty for putting Dan Ticktum into the wall on lap 33.
Felipe Drugovich made the alternate tyre strategy work to finish third after starting ninth on the grid as his UNI-Virtuosi teammate, Guanyu finished fifth with two additional points for fastest lap after a safety car failed to materialise whilst he led the race.
Ralph Boschung, Lawson, Vips, Roy Nissany and Richard Verschoor rounded out the top ten finishers.
Zhou now leads Piastri by 16 points with Pourchaire five points further back in third, ahead of Ticktum who sits fourth following his race retirement and Lawson who rounds out the top five in the driver standings.
Pourchaire made a clean start to lead Shwartzman as the top ten all held station, whilst HWA Racelab’s Jack Aitken stalled at lights out to ruin his race despite eventually rejoining the track after being fired up from the pit-lane.
Shwartzman tried to reel in Pourchaire but the French teenage maintained his composure to bridge a gap of around one second to the Russian, as the gap difference ebbed and flowed until Pourchaire forced a 2.6s gap across laps 28 and 29.
Shwartzman consequently pitted on lap 30 but a dodgy left rear tyre change dropped him to fifth just before Pourchaire made his stop, only for the first Virtual Safety Car (VSC) to be deployed on that lap as Juri Vips rammed Marcus Armstrong into the barriers on exit of Rascasse.
The VSC ended one lap later only for Lirim Zendeli to plough his MP Motorsport into the wall on entry to Rascasse to cause another VSC, which was soon required again on the following lap as Oscar Piastri squeezed Dan Ticktum into the wall at the same corner with a late braking move.
Ticktum was unable to reverse and his Carlin car consequently had to be wheeled away as Zhou led until lap 38 when he pitted from the lead, rejoining in fifth where he finished at the flag with a last-gasp fastest lap.
Vips meanwhile retained eighth despite being slapped with a 5s time penalty for his collision with Armstrong, having bridged a 9.512s gap to ninth-placed Nissany.
Position | Driver | Team | Laps | Time |
1 | Theo Pourchaire | ART GP | 42 | 1h 01m 02.089 |
2 | Oscar Piastri | PREMA | 42 | + 2.894 |
3 | Felipe Drugovich | UNI-Virtuosi | 42 | + 14.261 |
4 | Robert Shwartzman | PREMA | 42 | + 17.910 |
5 | Guanyu Zhou | UNI-Virtuosi | 42 | + 24.130 |
6 | Ralph Boschung | Campos | 42 | + 30.693 |
7 | Liam Lawson | Hitech GP | 42 | + 31.288 |
8 | Juri Vips | Hitech GP | 42 | + 37.051 |
9 | Roy Nissany | DAMS | 42 | + 46.563 |
10 | Richard Verschoor | MP Motorsport | 42 | + 49.513 |
11 | Bent Viscaal | Trident | 42 | + 51.380 |
12 | Christian Lundgaard | ART GP | 42 | + 52.966 |
13 | David Beckmann | Charouz | 42 | + 55.834 |
14 | Marino Sato | Trident | 42 | + 1m 11.237 |
15 | Guilherme Samaia | Charouz | 42 | + 1 Lap |
16 | Gianluca Petecof | Campos | 42 | + 1 Lap |
17 | Alessio Deledda | HWA Racelab | 42 | + 1 Lap |
18 | Jack Aitken | HWA Racelab | 42 | + 2 Laps |
RET | Dan Ticktum | Carlin | Collision | |
RET | Lirim Zendeli | MP Motorsport | Crash | |
RET | Marcus Armstrong | DAMS | Collision | |
RET | Jehan Daruvala | Carlin | Damage |
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