Ireland’s Alex Dunne sees Belgian victory wiped out by race stewards

Ireland’s Alex Dunne had his victory in the Formula 2 race at Spa Francorchamps wiped out after race stewards deemed he had contravened the starting procedure in Sunday’s race.

The 19-year-old Rodin Motorsport driver started from pole position and held off challenges from Ritomo Miyata and Roman Stanek to win the race on the track.

He was later invited into the stewards’ room to review his start-up procedure and was handed a 10-second time penalty, dropping him down to ninth in the race standings and seeing him drop from first in the overall driver’s standings to fourth.

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Explaining their actions, the race stewards said: “After the race, Car 17 was referred to the Stewards by the Technical Delegate for an alleged breach of Article 1.6.1 FIA Formula 2 Technical Regulations, after failing to engage the start-up procedure.

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“A defined set-up procedure activation must be used during all formation starts and race starts and Car 17’s data shows that the driver did not engage the starting procedure.

“The Stewards then spoke to a team representative and the driver and having considered the matter extensively elected to give Dunne a 10-second time penalty in accordance with the FIA F2 penalty guideline. This means he loses the Spa Francorchamps Feature Race victory.”

The race win went to Stanek, who finished third on the track, after second-place finisher Arvid Lindblad was later disqualified for a technical infringement.