Two 1-2 finishes in Mugello
The Tuscan venue of Mugello brought fortune to the team this weekend after scoring all three poles and getting on the podium in all three races, two of which saw a 1-2 finish.
With a time of 1:48.230, Marcus Armstrong started on pole for Race 1 and held onto the race with ease taking the first win of the weekend. Teammate Juri Vips followed in P2, giving the team a positive points haul.
Race 2 saw them both on the top spots of the podium for a second time but had switched positions, giving Vips the win and Armstrong P2. Juan Manuel Correa had two top ten finishes taking P9 in race 1 and P8 in race 2, securing a good solid result for the team. Brazilian Enzo Fittipaldi showed good form in race 1 stepping onto the rookie podium, but race 2 saw him crash out in the early stages of the race after suffering a broken suspension caused by debris on track.
Having had two 1-2 finishes there were high hopes for the last race of the weekend. However a large incident, which was unfortunately unavoidable for Correa and ended his race, caused the session to be red flagged for a time. Vips stayed in P1 at the start after sitting on pole, but Van Uitert was all over the back of the Estonian and took the position resulting in Vips settling for P2. Armstrong was knocked hard by the red flag and although fought well to make his way up the field and having had a tremendous battle with Artem Petrov, the New Zealender finished P8. Ferrari Academy Driver Enzo Fittipaldi improved through the race and finish the weekend on a high with P6.
"We had a good collective test on Wednesday here prior to the race weekend where I felt fairly happy with the car until qualifying. In the first qualifying session we got pole. This was my third pole of the season and unfortunately on the second one we took a bit of a risk to go out later on new tyres. In my opinion it still was the best solution but there was a red flag on the last lap so we couldn’t get a good second lap. Nevertheless we still qualified fourth but unfortunately I was fourteenth for the last race which was a bit disappointing. In the first race I won. I was very happy with the car, it was almost perfect for that race. In Race 2, from fourth to second with a good start we made progress, did some good overtakings and I was happy to finish behind Juri and perhaps I could have gotten to him with a few extra laps. In race 3 track temperature was very high and with the old tyres we struggled a lot but fortunately we made a very good first lap picking up 7 positions at the first corner and we finished ultimately 8th with good points in total. We extended our championship lead so I can’t complain. The car has been great all week except for the third one but with old tyres it’s what it is.”
Leaving Mugello there is now a two month break for the Italian F4. Marcus Armstrong hangs onto the Driver Championship by 1 point as the team waits for their next appearance in Imola, 9-10th September.