Spa F3: Colombo dominates wet race by 13s after delayed start

The start of the race was delayed by an hour amid heavy rain and a drenched circuit, with an attempted start aborted as the poor weather resumed after a brief respite.

The safety car eventually came in at the end of lap three, leaving the drivers to race, albeit with incredibly poor visibility.

Campos Racing rookie Colombo, whose best finish was previously seventh, gained redemption after his win at the Hungaroring was taken away from him for a safety car distance violation.

Jak Crawford (Hitech Grand Prix) finished in second, with team-mate Roman Stanek finishing in third to take his second podium in three races.

Frederik Vesti came in fourth for ART Grand Prix, having started in sixth, with Victor Martins (MP Motorsport) in fifth.

As racing got underway, Collet and Martins made contact while battling Logan Sargeant (Charouz Racing System), with ART’s Alexander Smolyar also dropping back, although both MP Motorsport cars emerged unscathed.

On lap five, Collet moved round the outside of Clement Novalak (Trident) to move up into seventh, with Martins also managing to make progress.

Race winner Lorenzo Colombo, Campos Racing

Photo by: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Ido Cohen retired after pitting with a mechanical issue, having had no visible damage to his Carlin-run car.

With ten laps to go, Colombo had cleared a significant gap between himself and Crawford of four seconds, up to 5.2s by lap seven.

The yellow flag was waved after HWA Racelab’s Rafael Villagomez ended up in the wall coming out of Les Combes, close to where Ferrari Formula 1 driver Charles Leclerc had his FP2-ending crash on Friday.

The track began to dry out by lap eight, with Collet attempting to pass Frederik Vesti but almost being caught out by the ART driver’s braking point.

Colombo had built up an incredible eight-second lead by lap 11, increasing it to 10s by lap 12, by using his visibility advantage to take a storming win.

Collet moved up to fourth after a tense battle with Jenzer’s Johnathan Hoggard, Schumacher, and Vesti, taking positions on the run-off and somehow keeping the car in the right direction.

But he was handed a five-second time penalty for gaining an advantage while off the track, dropping him down the order.

The battle left Vesti in fifth, with Martins in sixth, Hoggard in seventh and Schumacher back in ninth.

Vesti managed to pass Collet the following corner, with team-mates Novalak and Schumacher tussling for eighth.

Feature race polesitter Jack Doohan will also start front of the grid for this afternoon’s reverse grid race, with Schumacher in second and Smolyar in third.

Collet will start fourth, with Sargeant in fifth and Novalak in sixth.

Race 1 results - 15 laps

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	Lorenzo Colombo	Campos Racing	-
2	Jak Crawford	HitechGP	13.400	13.400
3	Roman Staněk	HitechGP	15.400	15.400
4	Frederik Vesti	ART Grand Prix	19.000	19.000
5	Victor Martins	MP Motorsport	21.100	21.100
6	Johnathan Hoggard	Jenzer Motorsport	23.600	23.600
7	Clement Novalak	Trident	24.400	24.400
8	Logan Sargeant	Charouz Racing System	24.500	24.500
9	Caio Collet	MP Motorsport	25.200	25.200
10	Alexander Smolyar	ART Grand Prix	25.400	25.400
11	David Schumacher	Trident	25.900	25.900
12	Jack Doohan	Trident	26.900	26.900
13	Arthur Leclerc	Prema Powerteam	28.300	28.300
14	Dennis Hauger	Prema Powerteam	30.000	30.000
15	Ayumu Iwasa	HitechGP	31.400	31.400
16	Olli Caldwell	Prema Powerteam	44.300	44.300
17	Amaury Cordeel	Campos Racing	46.400	46.400
18	Hunter Yeany	Charouz Racing System	50.700	50.700
19	Matteo Nannini	HWA AG	53.400	53.400
20	Oliver Rasmussen	HWA AG	57.000	57.000
21	Jonny Edgar	Carlin	57.600	57.600
22	Juan Manuel Correa	ART Grand Prix	58.400	58.400
23	Tijmen van	MP Motorsport	59.100	59.100
24	Calan Williams	Jenzer Motorsport	1'00.600	1'00.600
25	László Tóth	Campos Racing	1'04.800	1'04.800
26	Zdenek Chovanec	Charouz Racing System	1'08.400	1'08.400
27	Rafael Villagómez	HWA AG	2'12.600	2'12.600
	Filip Ugran	Jenzer Motorsport	1 lap
	Ido Cohen	Carlin	11 laps
View full results