Alex Dunne produced a stunning recovery, aided by a Safety Car and fresh tyres, to finish P2 in the F2 Spanish GP Sprint race from 19th on the grid on Saturday afternoon. The Irishman has reclaimed the lead at the top of the standings from Luke Browning by three points.
On the opening lap of the race, the driver from Offaly made up six spots. Gabriele Minì took one of those back a few laps later in a move unseen on camera.
Safety Car transforms the F2 Spanish GP Sprint race for Alex Dunne
As he started to struggle on the harder tyre and looked like Goethe was going to pass him relatively soon, Montoya and Minì collided at turn 1 in front of them. With the Italian stopped on track, a Safety Car was required.
It opened the door for the 19-year-old to go on a charge once the Safety Car came in. From P11, he carved his way through the field with Verschoor to be in P2 with three laps to go.
Although he got into the DRS of the Dutch driver, he had to settle for 2nd place. Fastest lap meant a valuable extra point in the standings.
Alex Dunne on his unexpected P2 in the F2 Spain Sprint race
Alongside his understandable surprise at making 17 places in the Sprint, the driver from Offaly addressed his mistake in free practice when he hit Victor Martins on pit entry.
He was trying to practice an aggressive entry to pit lane but clipped the ART man. Dunne got handed a three-place drop for both races this weekend. An apology was instant for that.
The Rodin Motorsport driver also admitted to Pit Debrief and other media outlets that getting a better balance of going for aggressive moves alongside collecting valuable points for the championship.
“No, definitely not [expecting a comeback like that], I definitely didn’t wake up this morning thinking I was going to be sat here. But I think it’s a nice result to get and some good points.
“I think after what happened in Monaco and then what happened in FP yesterday morning, I think what happened in FP is completely ridiculous, I mean like this shouldn’t happen and I apologise to the team for that.
“So no, very very happy, I think we’ve seen over the past couple of weekends that the pace is more than there. But sometimes you know I think you just need to accept that you are where you are instead of trying to go for more, and I think that’s something that we’ll need to dial in a little bit more in the coming weekends.”
Dunne on racing Verschoor for the victory
In his fifth F2 season, Verschoor took his sixth victory in the category on Saturday after holding Dunne off in the final couple of laps.
Asked if he could have launched an attack with a lap or two more, the Irishman was focused on getting through the pack cleanly and not going for potential glory where it all could have ended in disaster at the end.
“I mean it’s shoulda woulda coulda, right?
“You know I think Richard [Verschoor] knows what he’s doing. And as we’ve seen through the year his pace is also very strong and I think you know he understands very well how to race.
“I think if there was a couple of more laps I maybe would have had an opportunity to try and make a move but then getting past is another thing.
“I think I was in a position where like I said after the past couple of weekends or well more so last weekend, I think I didn’t really want to try anything crazy and you know lose out on a load of points because of that.
“So I think after the Safety Car I just tried to get to the front as quick as possible and once I got to P2 I was pretty content with that.”
The call to pit
As the Sprint in Bahrain showed, pitting for fresh tyres behind a late Safety Car was king. On that day Dunne lost out heavily. In Barcelona on Saturday it fell his way, and he was leading the call to box as Gabriele Minì’s car had to be removed from track.
“I was right behind the crash between Gabby [Gabriele Minì] and Seb[astian Montoya] and as soon as that happened I said if there’s a Safety Car I think we should box. And then as soon as the safety car came out I pitted straight away.”
The huge difference between the soft and hards at the F2 Spanish GP
As the soft tyre runners came through at the end of the race, Verschoor, Dunne and co. looked like they were playing a video game on easy mode such was their pace and grip advantage on softs.
By the end of the race, the Dutch and Irish drivers had pulled a gap of over 11s to Jake Crawford who was the lead runner on hard tyres.
After running on hards in FP1, the drivers switched to softs in qualifying. They found over 2s such was the difference in pace between them.
Alex Dunne believes the step might be a bit too much as the race showed at the end.
“I think in terms of feeling both compounds aren’t bad. I think the the spread between hard and soft is probably a bit big to be honest.
“Even as drivers and as as rookies especially, if you look at FP to quali the jump when we have the the hard and the soft is like almost two and a half, three seconds sometimes which is a really big jump. It can be difficult to adapt to sometimes.
“I think also if you look at the end of the race like the tyre difference was insane. I’ve I haven’t been in that situation before so I didn’t really know what to expect.
“I said to myself you know if we managed to finish at least in the top 10 and get some points I’ll be happy, and I think within three laps I was already in the top three. So I was pretty surprised at the delta and the difference.
“But all in all I think both compounds aren’t bad but I think they’re just probably a little bit far away from each other in terms of deficit.”
Alex Dunne and Rodin Motorsport applying lessons from the Sprint for the F2 Spanish GP Feature race
The Sprint race was expected to be somewhat of a test session for Dunne and Rodin Motorsport after starting P19 on the grid. As the hard tyre stint went on, the Irish driver was slowly dropping away from the PREMA cars and lost DRS on the lap they collided.
In Bahrain and Imola, Alex Dunne showed tremendous pace on the hard tyre to win both races as he pointed out. He was by far the fastest on the hard tyre of those who ran the soft-hard strategy at Sakhir.
Starting in P8 thanks to another three-place grid penalty, the alternate strategy could be an option for the current F2 championship leader on Sunday morning.
However, thinking of the championship and not taking wild risks is key.
“Honestly a lot of our conversation in the team before the Sprint race today was what are we going to do tomorrow, and I think it’s really difficult to decide.
“I think to be completely honest our pace on the hard today probably wasn’t as good as I expected.
“I think both feature races that I’ve won so far have been won because the pace on the prime tyre that we’ve had has been really really strong, and I didn’t really feel like that today to be honest. The cars in front of me and the cars behind me felt slightly quicker than I was.
“So it’s really difficult to to tell to be honest, and I think I am in a position where going for the riskier strategy is possible. But I’m also in a position where doing the same thing as everyone else is still possible to have a good result.
“And I think with with the fight we’re in and with the championship at the moment taking crazy risks is probably not the best idea but we are in a position where it could be could be definitely a thought.
“We’ll have to wait and see tomorrow but I’m sure we’ll analyse all opportunities.”
The events of Monaco and the learnings taken from it
A podium in the F2 Spanish GP Sprint race was a huge result for Alex Dunne following his misjudgement at the start of the Feature in Monaco last Sunday. The Irishman took out Victor Martins, himself and ultimately five other drivers with a move into turn 1 that was always going to end in contact with the French driver.
Unfortunately in the age of social media, the 19-year-old received vile abuse as keyboard warriors showed their true colours once again.
Asked if he would be changing his style, Dunne says small little tweaks and better decisions are required as he looks to win the F2 title in his rookie year. Most importantly, he maintains the full sport of both McLaren and Rodin Motorsport as the immense talent of the Irishman is still obvious.
“I don’t think there’s any point in me commenting on Monaco really, what happened happened.
“But yeah I think moving forward it’s clear that you know in these scenarios maybe sometimes you just need to rein it back a little bit.
“I think everyone knows Monaco turn one if you come out in the lead the chance of you finishing there is pretty high.
“But I think it was just one of those things and I think moving forward just to bring it back in a little bit is all that needs to be done. Nothing massive needs to change.
“I think we’ve won two Feature races at this point because we’ve done a lot of things right and I think we’ve done more things right than we have done wrong. So there are a couple of little things to work on but that’s natural and I know what they are.
“So yeah I think everyone around me is still pushing me on at McLaren, the team [Rodin Motorsport] and everyone like that is still fully behind me and still happy with how I’m doing.
“So yeah a couple of little things to change but should be fine.”
