Joshua Dürksen beats INVICTA teammate for his second win of the weekend

Credit: Formula 2 via X

After starting in second place, Joshua Dürksen fought off his INVICTA teammate to be on the top step of the podium for the second time this weekend. The podium was completed by Rafael Câmara in second and Noel Leon in third. 

How it happened

After pole-sitter Câmara went wide on Lap 1, Dürksen took the lead of the race early on. 

Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak, who started in fifth, found himself in third place before the end of the first lap. The ART Grand Prix driver also set the first fastest lap of the race on Lap 3 with a time of 1:33.709. 

With DRS enabled, the two INVICTA drivers continuously swapped positions, fighting for first versus second. Câmara took the lead back from his teammate on Lap 4

One lap later, Dürksen took advantage of DRS and was able to get back into first. After a mandatory pit stop for the Paraguayan driver, he fell back to 22nd place. 

Lap 7 saw eight drivers take their mandatory pit stop, which gave the lead of the race to Emerson Fittipaldi. 

Dürksen continuously set the fastest sectors and the fastest lap on Lap 11. In addition to being the fastest car, he was the highest-placed out of the cars who had pitted.

On Lap 12, the yellow flag came out as Colton Herta found himself in the gravel after an overall difficult weekend. The safety car came out shortly after, which gave the rest of the grid an advantage on their pit stops.

When the safety car came in at the end of Lap 16, the bunched-up top three order was Dürksen, Câmara, and Alexander Dunne. Dunne locked up and went wide on Lap 17, which dropped him back to fourth place.

With two-thirds of the race distance completed, championship leader Nikola Tsolov had only made up one place after starting in ninth due to a penalty.

The battle for first heated up on Lap 21, as the top three were only separated by 1.6 seconds. On Lap 24, the two INVICTA drivers were given permission to race each other.

With three laps remaining, the fight for fourth place intensified, with seven drivers all within DRS range. 

On the final lap, the INVICTA cars fought closely and were only separated by 0.5 seconds. In the end, Dürksen won out, followed by Câmara in second and Leon in third.