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Spa Formula 3: Ferrari's Armstrong dominates, Laaksonen in big crash

Ferrari Formula 1 junior Marcus Armstrong won the Spa FIA Formula 3 Championship's second race at Spa in a dominant drive, making up for a poor qualifying

Prema Racing's Armstrong was only 19th on the grid for the first race, but moved up to eighth and took pole for Sunday's encounter in the process.

He extended a lead and moved out of DRS range at the start of the race, before a crash on lap three for Simo Laaksonen brought out a safety car.

MP Motorsport's Laaksonen went off at the exit of Blanchimont at high speed and was buried under the barrier. He was taken to the infield medical centre for checks.

A brief rain shower threatened to complicate the race, but it soon halted and once the barrier was repaired the race resumed on lap nine of 17.

Armstrong again pulled an impressive gap after the restart and wouldn't be matched.

There were no celebrations following the race from the top three in the wake of the death of Formula 2 driver Anthoine Hubert on Saturday.

Renault junior Christian Lundgaard eventually got ahead of Red Bull and Honda junior Yuki Tsunoda - after voicing his displeasure at Tsunoda's defence on the Kemmel Straight - and looked to have established second position in the second half of the race.

But Tsunoda dived down the inside at the end of the Kemmel Straight to take the position back on the penultimate lap.

A last lap battle had decided the podium places on Saturday and the same thing occurred in race two.

Ferrari and SMP junior Robert Shwartzman faked right and made Lundgaard defend, then Shwartzman went all the way around the outside to take third for Prema ahead of Lundgaard and behind Tsunoda.

Points leader Shwartzman's move was even more important as it put another car between him and his closest championship rival Jehan Daruvala, who took fifth for Prema ahead of race one winner Pedro Piquet.

Leonardo Pulcini dropped down the order when pushed off at La Source on lap one, but recovered to seventh.

Honda junior Teppei Natori scored his best result of the season in eighth ahead of Carlin team-mate Felipe Drugovich. Yifei Ye rounded out the top 10 for Hitech Grand Prix.

Championship contender Juri Vips - who is the Red Bull junior most likely to have enough superlicence points for any F1 chance next year - suffered a blow as he was pushed off at the first corner by Tsunoda, who dived up the inside of Pulcini and pushed Pulcini into Vips on lap one.

On the lap eight restart, Vips then broke his front wing and finished 21st.

Race two result

Pos Driver Team Laps Gap
1 Marcus Armstrong Prema Racing 17 42m03.504s
2 Yuki Tsunoda Jenzer Motorsport 17 4.515s
3 Robert Shwartzman Prema Racing 17 5.616s
4 Christian Lundgaard ART Grand Prix 17 6.538s
5 Jehan Daruvala Prema Racing 17 7.612s
6 Pedro Piquet Trident 17 8.200s
7 Leonardo Pulcini Hitech GP 17 9.124s
8 Teppei Natori Carlin 17 10.245s
9 Felipe Drugovich Carlin 17 10.843s
10 Yifei Ye Hitech GP 17 13.881s
11 Richard Verschoor MP Motorsport 17 15.469s
12 David Beckmann ART Grand Prix 17 16.613s
13 Sebastian Fernandez Campos Racing 17 16.929s
14 Bent Viscaal HWA 17 18.504s
15 Keyvan Andres HWA 17 20.391s
16 Alex Peroni Campos Racing 17 25.046s
17 Andreas Estner Jenzer Motorsport 17 25.426s
18 Fabio Scherer Charouz 17 25.864s
19 Liam Lawson MP Motorsport 17 26.724s
20 Alessio Deledda Campos Racing 17 27.058s
21 Juri Vips Hitech GP 17 1m37.427s
22 Lirim Zendeli Charouz 15 2 Laps
- Logan Sargeant Carlin 14 Retirement
- Raoul Hyman Charouz 14 Retirement
- Max Fewtrell ART Grand Prix 13 Retirement
- Jake Hughes HWA 9 Retirement
- Devlin Defrancesco Trident 9 Retirement
- Simo Laaksonen MP Motorsport 2 Retirement
- Niko Kari Trident 1 Retirement
- Giorgio Carrara Jenzer Motorsport 1 Retirement

Drivers' standings

Pos Driver Points
1 Robert Shwartzman 152
2 Jehan Daruvala 129
3 Juri Vips 122
4 Marcus Armstrong 119
5 Christian Lundgaard 93
6 Pedro Piquet 74
7 Leonardo Pulcini 61
8 Max Fewtrell 57
9 Jake Hughes 56
10 Yuki Tsunoda 37
11 Liam Lawson 22
12 David Beckmann 20
13 Niko Kari 15
14 Bent Viscaal 10
15 Richard Verschoor 9
16 Felipe Drugovich 8
17 Lirim Zendeli 6
18 Alex Peroni 5
19 Logan Sargeant 3
20 Simo Laaksonen 2
21 Teppei Natori 1
22 Fabio Scherer 1


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