MP Motorsport’s Dorian Boccolacci claimed his first victory of the season at the Hungaroring with a strong display of tyre management, finishing clear of championship rivals Callum Ilott and Anthoine Hubert.
Dorian Boccolacci (FRA, MP Motorsport) leads the start of the second GP3 race, the only time he was challenged.
Photo: Zak Mauger / GP3 Series Media Service.
Boccolacci made a perfect start from pole position, defending from Juan Manuel Correa and Callum Ilott in turn one. The three drivers were side by side through the apex of turn one, leaving Ilott with nowhere to go and the Brit used the run-off area to his advantage to take second position as Correa lost out to Anthoine Hubert. Boccolacci, 19 years old, then checked out setting fastest lap after fastest lap to stretch out to a three second lead, keeping him clear of the DRS zone when it came into affect on lap three.
Equally, Ilott pulled away from the fast starting championship leader Anthoine Hubert but Boccolacci was in a different league in regards to early race pace. Hubert jumped from sixth to third in the opening corners. Campos Racing’s Leonardo Pulcini made a great start up to fifth place from seventh on the grid and then pulled off an audacious move around the outside of turn two to take fourth position off Correa on lap five.
By this stage, MP Motorsport’s Niko Kari had already ended his dreadful weekend off at turn 11 on the opening lap and Giuliano Alesi had also pitted, leaving him resigned to a non-scoring weekend.
Trident had to hold their breath early on as team debutant David Beckmann dived past Ryan Tveter for sixth. Beckmann, who had moved across from the Jenzer Motorsport team during the week, then set on attacking Correa for lap after lap. The German took a late dive into turn one on lap nine and made contact on the apex with his former team’s car but both cars got away with no damage.
Yesterday’s winner Nikita Mazepin (RUS, ART Grand Prix) lost ground in the championship
Photo: Zak Mauger / GP3 Series Media Service.
A quiet race for yesterday’s race winner Nikita Mazepin, who fell to tenth at the start, got even worse as he fell back into the clutches of Silverstone winner Trident’s Pedro Piquet. Piquet, using his DRS, made the move on lap 11 in turn one leaving Mazepin down to a disappointing 11th. The Russian’s race got worse with Simo Laaksonen making his way past late on. Not what the championship contender needed, losing all the ground he gained yesterday.
Boccolacci had extended his lead to 5.3 seconds by the half way point of the 17 lap race but the question was had the Frenchman pushed too hard early on?
The answer was no as the MP Motorsport cruised to victory, making amends for his disqualification from victory in France. Boccolacci won by 2.3 seconds from ART Grand Prix’s Callum Ilott, who inturn closed the gap to the championship leader Anthoine Hubert, who rounded out the podium in third.
Leonardo Pulcini scored another strong result with fourth to move back up to third in the championship ahead of the third ART of Nikita Mazepin, who finished in a low-key 12th. Juan Manuel Correa managed to hold off the hard charging Trident of Ryan Tveter for fifth, who squeezed past team-mate David Beckmann with two laps to go for sixth.
Beckmann came home in seventh for a second points scoring race of the weekend for his new team whilst Tatiana Calderon scored her first point of the season for Jenzer Motorsport in eighth ahead of Pedro Piquet.
