PREMA’s Zak O’Sullivan is pleased with his “strong” performance in Hungary to reignite his title ambitions.
A difficult weekend on home soil at Silverstone left O’Sullivan 55 points off championship leader, Gabriel Bortoleto but he immediately responded by topping Practice, before he claimed two points for pole position as he topped Qualifying to earn his first pole position of the season.
Speaking post Qualifying, O’Sullivan stated that he had enjoyed a “really good” start to the weekend with “strong ” pace, as he snatched pole with his first push lap of his final run.
O’Sullivan enjoyed a positive Sprint Race as he recovered from 12th on the reverse-grid to ninth on the opening lap but his race was undone by a reckless defensive move from ART GP’s Nikola Tsolov on Lap 12, as the Brit tried to pass on the inside of Turn 1 with a late braking move only for Tsolov to cut across and destroy his front wing.
The 18 year-old Williams junior eventually recovered to 22nd but fell 63 points behind Bortoleto who had finished third in the Sprint, which further extended his title lead.
O’Sullivan however absolved Tsolov of all responsibility for their collision, as he explained: “I made a little mistake on my part running in P8 and lost the front wing.”
O’Sullivan however responded with a flawless lights-to-flag victory with the fastest lap in the Feature Race whilst Bortoleto only finished seventh, which propelled the Cheltenham-born driver up to second in the standings and 63 points off Bortoleto with a maximum of 68 points available across the final two rounds of the season.
The result also marked O’Sullivan’s fourth race victory of the season which marked a record-equalling fourth win in the category, matching Frederik Vesti, Dennis Hauger and Jack Doohan who have also claimed four wins at F3 level and now race in F2.
O’Sullivan’s PREMA teammate, Dino Beganovic meanwhile pushed the Brit all the way which he welcomed, as he commented: “The pace was really strong, and I managed to pull a gap early. It got a bit tricky in the end, as Dino started catching on the last couple of laps.”
Reflecting upon his strong weekend as a whole, O’Sullivan concluded: “It has been a really good weekend for me and the team, 1 and 2 in the feature race means good points. The pace has been strong all weekend, so I’m looking forward to Spa.”
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