Mazepin tops times in F2 free practice

Nikita Mazepin powered to the top of the timesheet in today’s free practice session of the FIA Formula 2 Championship, being held in support of this weekend’s Formula 1 Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix 2020 at Bahrain International Circuit.

Mazepin got the meeting’s F2 action underway by setting the session’s fastest lap of 1min 42.660secs in his Hitech Grand Prix challenger.
The Carlin pair of Jehan Daruvala and Yuki Tsunoda followed. Daruvala was 0.122 seconds behind and Tsunoda 0.258s back.

Dams’ Dan Ticktum, ART Grand Prix’s Christian Lungaard, Hitech’s Luca Ghiotto, Prema Racing’s Robert Shwartzman and Uni-Virtuosi’s Guanyu Zhou rounded out the top eight from F2’s 22-driver field.

F2 now heads for its qualifying session at 4.15pm later this afternoon. That will determine the grid for tomorrow’s Feature Race, set to be held over 32 laps. The weekend’s second event, the 23-lap Sprint Race, will be held on Sunday, with the top eight of race one starting in reverse order.