Zane Maloney wins FIA F3 Spa-Francorchamps feature race

Zane Maloney becomes the sixth F3 feature race winner of the 2022 season, crossing the line first in Spa-Francorchamps.

The Trident driver started the race from second and after taking the lead on lap 11, he held position till the checkered flag, to take his first ever Formula 3 race win.

Caio Collet began the race on pole, with Maloney and Francesco Pizzi behind him. 

As the lights went out and the race got underway, Collet got off the line quickly and held his lead. However Pizzi was not so fortunate, dropping down the order after dipping his wheel in the gravel.

In the last corner of lap one, Pizzi and MP Motorsport’s Kush Maini made contact forcing a yellow flag. Joint championship leader coming into the weekend Victor Martins, was also caught up in the incident forcing him and Maini to retire from the race and prompted a virtual safety car which was quickly upgraded to a full safety car. 

Before the safety car was deployed, Goethe managed to haul himself up into the lead of the race, meaning the top five under safety car conditions read: Goethe, Collet, Maloney, Staněk and Edgar.

When racing resumed on lap six, Goethe held the lead till the Kemmel straight, where Collet stormed past him, however the Brazilian was given a time penalty for an unsafe re-entry on the opening lap. Goethe was then swiftly overtaken by Maloney, leaving him third going into lap seven.

Staněk then made a move on Goethe on lap seven, which put the Czech driver into the final podium spot.

To round off a chaotic seventh lap, the safety car was once again deployed after Gregoire Saucy found himself in the barriers.

As the race got underway again on lap eleven, Collet held the lead off the restart, but later in the lap, Zane Maloney grasped the lead, powering round the outside of Collet at Les Combes.

On lap fourteen, Roman Staněk launched himself up into second place, using DRS to get past the helpless Caio Collet.

During the seventeenth lap, an epic battle commenced in the fight for eleventh place, with eight drivers scrapping for the position. 

At Les Combes in the final lap of the race, Oliver Bearman made the move past Oliver Goethe, putting him up to fourth position and bagging him the final spot on the podium after third place runner Caio Collet’s penalty demoted him to sixth.

When the checkered flag was waved signalling the end of the race, it would be Zane Maloney who would take the feature race victory, with Roman Staněk in second completing a trident 1-2.

With third Oliver Bearman being the only driver to score points of the top five going into the race, his fifteen point haul saw him leapfrog Prema teammate Arthur Leclerc and ART’s Victor Martins to set second in the standings, only one point behind championship leader Isack Hadjar. 

Oliver Goethe would finish fourth and Jonny Edgar rounded out the top five, as the Trident team ended the weekend with a fifty four point feature race haul.