Bruno’s Take: The title race is wide open

CEO Bruno Michel looks back at the fifth round of the FIA Formula 3 season and picks out his key topics from Silverstone. He discusses the new race winners, the drama of the final laps in Race 2 and speaks about the new Championship leader.

TWO NEW RACE WINNERS

We’ve had seven different F3 winners in the past ten races. Logan Sargeant and Bent Viscaal added their names to the list last weekend at Silverstone. Only two drivers have managed to take two wins so far: Liam Lawson and Théo Pourchaire. This season has been quite unpredictable, and the racing has also been great.

GAME CHANGE

We could see it coming: Sargeant has been consistently fighting at the front of the field since the start of the season. He was in a good position to claim a first win two weeks ago when he started from pole position, but he could only finish third. So last Saturday, he was back on pole, becoming the first driver this season to do so twice, and he did everything right to claim a maiden win.

With it, he moved to the top spot of the Championship, edging his teammate Oscar Piastri by one point. It will be interesting to see if Sargeant can keep the lead in Barcelona, or if Piastri will bounce back from a disappointing weekend.

TITLE RACE

We are past the halfway point of the season, and the title race is still wide open. Six drivers remain in contention: Sargeant, Piastri, David Beckmann, Lawson, Frederik Vesti and Pourchaire. All bar Vesti are race winners, but the Dane has the race craft to claim victory too. Sargeant in first currently leads Pourchaire in sixth by only 37 points. At this point, nothing is set in stone and the smallest of mistakes could make a huge difference in the end…

FINAL LAPS DRAMA

Like I said, the racing has been really great so far, with the drivers fighting their way through the field. More than once, we’ve seen some final laps drama. It was the case again on Sunday between Viscaal and Lirim Zendeli. The Dutchman made a big impression in wet conditions in Budapest, but eventually finished outside of the points.

In Silverstone, he put huge pressure on Zendeli all race long, and took the lead on the final lap. The German fought back, but he lost the lead again to Viscaal in the last corner, making it one of the most dramatic ends to our races. That was incredible to watch!