Starting from pole, Jehan Daruvala completed fastest lap and surged to top of podium in Race 1 at the Formula 1 circuit of Spa – Francorchamps in Belgium on Friday. He later finished third in the Race 2 after 16 laps to bag his third consecutive podium finish in the championship. However, in the third race on Saturday, Daruvala finished a poor eleventh with legendary Michael Schumacher’s son Mick finishing on top of the podium.
The teenage racing sensation from Mumbai, had a tense qualifying earlier, and began setting lap times with only five minutes left for the session to end. Jehan was fifth on the timesheets after his first lap and improved to provisional second on the next lap. On his third and last effort, Jehan gave it everything for a brilliant lap to bag pole position by 0.10 seconds ahead of the then championship leader – Marcus Armstrong from New Zealand. Jehan managed to lap the seven-kilometre circuit in a time of 2:12.983, while Spaniard, Alex Palou was third, two-tenths behind Jehan.
Starting from Pole Jehan fell third in Race 1 but took advantage of the slip stream and muscled his way into second. Alex Palou was still ahead of Jehan, who in turn faced no threat. Jehan went around the outside of Palou to grab the race lead. Jehan then pulled off a series of fastest race laps to move out of Palou’s reach completely, before easing off a bit, at the end. The Sahara Force India Academy racer, eventually won the race with a comfortable margin of 3.2 seconds ahead of Palou and a massive 11.9 seconds ahead of Estonian racer, Ralf Aron in third.
The victory was also Jehan’s fourth podium of 2018 in the FIA F3 series, which is arguably one of the toughest stepping stones to reach Formula 1. “The start was not ideal, but I kept my cool as I knew we were quick. Once I was ahead, I just had to make sure I made no mistakes. A lot of credit goes to the team for all the effort that they have put in.” said Jehan after the win.
The 19-year-old closed the gap to Daniel Ticktum of Great Britain and Fabio Scherer in the Race 2 who bagged first and second spots. But the Indian had to remain satisfied with third spot a creditable finish after starting twelfth from the grid. The third race was disappointing for Daruvala as he faded in slippery conditions to eleventh after starting fourth from the grid. German driver Mick had started sixth from grid but surpassed all in front of him to bag his maiden European F3 win. Russian Robert Shvartzman came second and Marcus Armstrong third.
