Bearman wins the sprint, Bortoleto keeps the championship lead

After more than two months of absence, Formula 2 is back in Qatar, a circuit that the category is discovering for the first time. During this long period of break, a lot of things happened in the antechamber of F1, particularly regarding the drivers lined up in the championship.

Six changes took place for the last two Grands Prix of the season: at Dams, Juan Manuel Correa was replaced by the Swede Dino Beganovic. Enzo Fittipaldi, who is expected to fly to the United States, has been replaced by John Bennett at VAR. Richard Verschoor, previously involved with Trident, has taken Dennis Hauger's place at MP Motorsport, the Dutchman will be replaced by Max Esterson. While he had taken the place of Taylor Barnard, entered in Formula E with McLaren, Niels Koolen will in turn be replaced by Cian Shields at AIX Racing.

As a reminder, Zak O'Sullivan was fired at ART, replaced by Luke Browning, and Oliver Goethe took over the seat from Franco Colapinto at MP Motorsport.

For this sprint race, Oliver Bearman will start from pole position, followed by Isack Hajar and Oliver Goethe. Victor Martins will start in seventh position, Gabriel Bortoleto will follow suit. Remember that the Brazilian is still at the top of the standings, just four and a half points behind Isack Hadjar, second.

Several drivers chose medium tires for this sprint, this is the case of our two Frenchmen Hadjar and Martins. However, we know that the track is very abrasive at Losail. Pepe Martí was unable to start the race due to a technical problem.

At the start, Bearman kept his first position, but Hadjar tried to take advantage of the tire advantage by maintaining pressure on the Briton. Martins took off very well and gained three positions in one go. On the second lap, Hadjar finally took the lead of the race with an overtake on the inside of turn 9. Behind, the other Frenchman seemed to slow down his pace and put himself under pressure from Jak Crawford.

On the fifth lap, Goethe's engine goes up in smoke and triggers a Virtual Safety Car. Hadjar, still in the lead, attacked hard to gain a lead of more than three seconds over his runner-up. The event resumes and four drivers race for third position: Martins, Crawford, Verschoor and Aron. The cars on medium tires already seem to be suffering.

Crawford tries several attacks on Martins, without finding the fault, however, the American is becoming more and more impatient. Hadjar loses ground as Bearman descends on the Campos driver. There are only 1.7 seconds left between the two.

On lap 15, Bearman reached the leader's DRS zone. Behind, Crawford managed to gain the advantage over Martins on the start/finish straight. The Frenchman's pace completely collapses, Verschoor overtakes him in turn. Bortoleto tries the outside on Aron in front of him, but the Estonian defends well. Martins falls in the peloton, he is seventh.

On the 21st lap, Bearman threw himself into braking and regained the lead of the race at Hadjar, the Frenchman tried to overtake at turns 3 and 4 and spun, he left in fourth position. A few moments later, Kimi Antonelli clashes with Kush Maini, the Safety Car is deployed.

The race ends like this, Oliver Bearman wins in the sprint in Qatar, Jak Crawford and Richard Verschoor complete the podium. With his sixth place, Gabriel Bortoleto maintains the lead in the championship, but Isack Hadjar manages to take back a few points from him: the gap is now 2.5 units between the two drivers.