F2: Tatiana Calderon out of Budapest race 2

A contact with Arjun Maini forced Tatiana Calderon to retire from Sunday's Hungaroring race, as Mick Schumacher took his maiden Formula 2 victory.

Starting from the fourth grid slot yesterday's feature race and missing out on the chance to get his maiden podium in Formula 2, Mick Schumacher converted his reverse-grid pole into race lead at the start of Sunday's sprint race when Nobuharu Matsushita had a great getaway from second but ran slightly wide at turn one.

Behind them, Sette Camara gained one position from Jordan King, while Luca Ghiotto had a slow start and completed the first lap in 9th place.

Tatiana Calderon, after completing Saturday's race in P16, had a clean start and kept her position in the first few laps.

On lap 3, the fast charging Deletraz found a way around the BWT Arden driver and Boschung passed Calderon one lap later. From the 18th position, the Colombian started to find some pace.

In front, Matsushita posted the fastest lap and maintained his gap to Schumacher within one second, with the whole field still very much compacted.

On the seventh lap, Arjun Maini tried a very late move on Tatiana Calderon by diving on the inside of turn one and hit the #18 Arden in the process, breaking her front suspension. It is the fourth retirement for Calderon in her Formula 2 debut campaign, coming in a high-degradation race that could have resulted in Calderon possibly gaining positions in the closing stages as the 26-year old has so far proved to be capable of nursing her tyres very well.

By lap 10, Schumacher had not checked out from his competitors yet and the top-4 were still very much within one second to each other.

Yesterday's winner Nicholas Latifi followed closely his championship rival Nyck De Vries in P6 and P7.

The race came back alive when Sette Camara attempted a late move on Matsushita at lap 17 for second; the Carlin and DAMS drivers switched positions at turn one and on the run to turn two, but the Japanese driver defended well and stayed in front. At the same time, Ghiotto attacked Mazepin: the two rubbed wheels, the Italian completing the move when Mazepin was forced on the grass. Ilott also took advantage from the fight and passed the Russian ART driver.

Matsushita kept putting unbearable pressure on Mick Schumacher by staying constantly within DRS range for the whole final part of the race, but Schumacher completed an error-free day and took the checkered flag after 28 laps to get his first podium finish and first victory nonetheless in the main Formula 1 feeder series. 

Matsushita was second and Sette Camara third, while Jordan King finished 4th ahead of Jack Aitken.   

In the points standings, De Vries still leads Latifi by 30 points, whereas Sette Camara brought himself up to third in the points table with today's podium finish.

The next Formula 2 race will be in Spa Francorchamps in three weeks time, after F1 summer break, where hopefully Tatiana Calderon will be able to score her first points of the season with still four weekend on the calendar.

Ph credits: F2 Media