F3: Ferrari junior Beganovic wins F3 sprint race at Spa-Francorchamps

Ferrari junior driver, Dino Beganovic overtook his Prema team-mate Gabriele Minì and fended off a race-long challenge from the Italian to take victory at a damp Spa-Francorchamps Sprint Race.

Dino Beganovic started the sprint race from pole position, though it was teammate Minì who made the better start to take the lead into Turn 1.

Just behind them, Tim Tramnitz had gotten ahead of Santiago Ramos for P3, while Arvid Lindblad made a fast start from P27 and was already up to 16th by the end of Lap 1.

But a Safety Car was required with Jenzer Motorsport’s Max Esterson having slowly spun into the barrier at Eau Rouge. The American driver was okay, and we returned to racing at the end of Lap 3.

The battles were well and truly on as Beganovic got ahead of Minì at the end of the Kemmel Straight just after the restart, while León took back the P5 spot he had lost to Luke Browning at the original start.

Lap 5 and Tramnitz was coming under pressure from Ramos and León and while he was able to hold on to P3, Browning was struggling and lost sixth position to Sebastián Montoya having ran wide at Turn 4.

The Hitech Pulse-Eight driver then came under pressure from Sami Meguetounif and the two ran wide on the entry to Les Combes, with the Frenchman getting ahead for P7.

The top six from Beganovic to Montoya were covered by just two and a half seconds as they started Lap 9 of 12, with Minì told by his race engineer to keep the pressure on his teammate.

But making the moves was León as he got ahead of Ramos for P4 at the end of the Kemmel Straight, with Lindblad now up to 12th after getting past Rodin Motorsport’s Joseph Loake.

DRS had now been made available, as Minì came under pressure from Tramnitz for second. He was able to hold off the MP driver but as they squabbled, Beganovic was able to pull out a one second gap.

This was playing into the hands of Meguetounif, Browning and Leonardo Fornaroli in seventh, eighth and ninth place, as they closed up to the top six.

In the closing stages of the race, Beganovic looked in control of the race, and he brought his Prema car home to take his second win of the season.

Championship leader Mini held on to finish second from Leon in third. Tramnitz saw off Ramos to finish P4, with the Mexican driver taking fifth ahead of his Trident teammate Meguetounif.

However, the French rookie would drop down the order to P28 after being penalised for multiple track limit infringements.

This pushed Browning up to sixth ahead of Montoya seventh, with Fornaroli in eighth. Oliver Goethe finished in ninth for Campos Racing, while Callum Voisin took the last point in P10.

Expanding on his race win, Beganovic noted: “P1 in the Sprint Race, very nice to finally be on the top step again, it feels very good.

"Very tricky conditions today, me and Gabriele had a good fight in the beginning, he got me at the start but I was able to recover it and then after that it was a bit of management and also conditions were very tricky, so it was not easy but I am very happy with this result.”

Having finished the Spa Sprint second, championship leader Gabriele Minì moved to 128 points to extend his lead to eight points at the top of the Drivers’ Championship, with Hitech Pulse-Eight’s Luke Browning second.

Leonardo Fornaroli jumps ahead of Arvid Lindblad to third place, the Trident driver now on 115 points, two ahead of the PREMA Racing driver, while Dino Beganovic is up to fifth on 100 points.

PREMA Racing are closing in on the Teams’ Championship and are now on 341 points, while ART Grand Prix went scoreless in the Sprint Race so stay second with 225 points. Trident are third with 192 points, with Campos Racing fourth on 152 and Hitech Pulse-Eight in fifth with 146.