Palmer and Stoneman trade blow for blow in their battle for F2 supremacy

12/08/2010

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With fourteen rounds of the eighteen race series behind them, Jolyon Palmer and Dean Stoneman remain locked in a tense mano a mano struggle for the 2010 FIA Formula Two championship. Following an almost completely barren weekend at Brands Hatch in mid July, Comma-sponsored Palmer bounced back with another win and fifth place at the demanding Brno circuit, while Stoneman registered a brace of second places to slice another point from Jolyon's wafer-thin championship lead going into the weekend. It's now just four points the difference: 221 to 217!

Apart from these two, Austria's Philipp Eng is now the only other driver with a theoretical chance of displacing the battling Brits to claim the Formula Two title and a coveted Williams F1 test drive. But for him to do so, both the leaders would have to fail to add to their points tally in any of the four remaining races. As if!

Including Eng, half a dozen drivers remain in realistic contention for the third championship spot which - like the top two - will earn an upgrade to the ‘A' licence qualification required for drivers to compete in Formula 1.

Prologue
Brno's two practice sessions ultimately offered little that was conclusive by way of a guide to qualifying. The first, which Jolyon comfortably headed, was held on a wet track - not forecast to be repeated during the weekend - and both sessions were red flagged within the vital last five minutes when drivers are normally making their big push for a quick time.

Qualifying for Race 1 saw Stoneman holding his impressive Brands Hatch form. On a track which was new to him, he whittled his times down to edge Nicola Demarco out of pole position by just 0.045sec. A yellow flag late in the session jeopardised Jolyon's big effort, stranding him fifth alongside Philipp Eng on the third row, with Sergey Afanasiev and Benjamin Bailly forming the meat between them and the front row pair.

Race 1
Demarco made a great start to steal the lead from Stoneman in the long run down to Turn 1, where Jolyon lost a place when he was obliged to get out of the throttle when squeezed between Bailly and Eng. Brno poses a challenge to overtake which is as difficult as anywhere in the series, so although Stoneman closed to within 2 seconds of the lead that Demarco had built up by mid-race, the Italian pressed on to score an emotional first F2 victory by a little over 3 seconds - pretty comfortable by F2 standards. Jolyon meanwhile had to be patient and heap the pressure on Eng to regain his fifth position, which he achieved on lap 13 when the Austrian just left the door ajar by running slightly wide in Turn 3. Eng immediately attempted to strike back, but Jolyon kept his shape and - with Bailly and Afanasiev now out of reach in the laps remaining - held on to his position to claim 10 crucial championship points at the finish. Despite not converting his pole position into a victory, Stoneman had fulfilled his pre-race intention to "finish in front of Jolyon and Philipp". In the process, he had also wrested the championship lead from Jolyon. Now, how would Comma's flag-bearer respond?

Qualifying 2
Twenty minutes into the half hour session, Stoneman laid down a benchmark for anyone else to beat. Nobody did, but the scriptwriters had clearly been enjoying themselves, placing Jolyon on the front row alongside the driver from Southampton. This was going to be eyeball-to-eyeball stuff: who was going to blink first? Equally intriguing, who else might spoil their party? Eng, Kazim Vasiliauskas and Demarco - hard chargers all - were immediately behind them, and all qualified within less than a second of pole position.

Race 2
From the ‘dirty' side of the grid, Jolyon nevertheless made one of his best starts of the year, leading down the pit straight to steal the advantage through Turn 1. With ‘race on', Stoneman gave the leader no rest though, and with the pair exchanging fastest sector and lap times, it was beyond half distance before Jolyon had established a one second gap over his pursuer. In turn, Stoneman had stretched away by 4 seconds from Eng running in third place. Close battles were fought throughout the mid-field, but they were secondary to the contest up front. With less than two laps to go, Stoneman had once again closed the gap between himself and Jolyon to half a second. It was a great challenge, but just not quite enough. Jolyon once again kept his shape and had sufficient in the tank to finally run out a convincing lights-to-flag winner by a 2.194sec margin. Eng suffered bitter disappointment when his car failed on the final lap, leaving Vasliliauskas to inherit the third podium place, with Afanasiev and Zolder hero Benjamin Bailly claiming the other high points scoring positions.

Now, Stoneman's short-lived overnight championship lead has reverted once more to Jolyon. Could the meagre four points separating them just prove to be the tipping point come the final chequered flag in Valencia on September 19th?

"Me and Dean have been pretty evenly matched the whole year, so I'm sure it will go down to the wire.......it's nice to have an advantage now and making sure I keep it after the last two rounds," said Jolyon. Dean's take on things was typically combative. "It's not going to be a problem overtaking him and take the championship. Before I was quite a few points behind, but I've gained quite a lot of points in the last few races...... hopefully I can pull away in the championship", he said.

Mind games? A battle of wits as well as driving talents? Who will have the last word? Don't bet against it going to the final race before we find out.

Meantime, there's a one month gap for everyone to catch their breath and re-group before the German rounds of the championship at Oschersleben on September 3/4/5th.

Visit www.formulatwo.com for total coverage and live streaming of every Formula Two event, plus a wealth of background stories on the drivers and other essential features to keep you fully informed on the championship. It's the best, most comprehensive motorsport site on the internet. There is also complete HD TV screening of every race on Eurosport and Eurosport 2. Don't miss a minute of the action.

In addition to sponsorship of Jolyon Palmer's car, Comma is also the official Technical Partner to the FIA Formula Two Championship. All 24 of the identical 480bhp Williams F1 designed JPH1B cars competing in the series use engine oils, coolants and maintenance products supplied by Comma.