Campos Racing’s Pepe Marti edged out Alex Dunne to victory in a thrilling climax to the Formula 2 sprint race at the Hungaroring.
Marti converted reversed-grid pole into the lead at the start, while his team-mate took second away from Rodin Motorsport’s Alex Dunne. ART Grand Prix’s Victor Martins also challenged Dunne through the first few corners but couldn’t make a move stick.
Lindblad briefly grabbed the lead on lap eight by diving to the inside of Marti into turn one. The Red Bull juniors continued to go side by side until turn two, where Marti regained the advantage by squeezing Marti wide on the exit.
The pair ran close together for the next 11 laps until Dunne snatched second from Lindblad under braking for the first corner. Lindblad quickly fell into the clutches of Martins, who tried a move on the next lap but ended up slipping to fifth behind DAMS’ Jak Crawford.
The safety car was deployed two laps later after Prema’s Sebastian Montoya stopped on the pit straight.
A three-lap dash to the chequered flag followed, and Marti controlled proceedings until the final two corners of the race. Dunne tried to steal the lead at the penultimate turn, but ran wide after the pair made contact, and Marti resisted a further challenge from the McLaren junior at the final bend before holding on for victory by just 0.225 seconds.
Crawford prevailed in a frenetic battle with Lindblad to take third on the final lap, while Hitech GP’s Luke Browning passed fellow Williams Academy member Martins for fifth.
Invicta Racing’s Leonardo Fornaroli climbed from ninth and resisted a late challenge from title rival Richard Verschoor to finish seventh.
Verschoor’s MP Motorsport team-mate Oliver Goethe was ninth ahead of Hitech’s Dino Beganovic.
Invicta’s Roman Stanek, who is due to start from pole in Sunday’s feature race after topping qualifying, was rear-ended and spun around on lap one by Prema’s Gabriele Mini, who was handed a 10s penalty.
