Home Formula 4ADAC F4 Nicklas Nielsen gets first ADAC F4 win after restart

Nicklas Nielsen gets first ADAC F4 win after restart

by Peter Allen

Nielsen

Nicklas Nielsen took his maiden single-seater win in race two of the ADAC Formula 4 opener at Oschersleben, but only after the initial start was red-flagged.

Danish driver Nielsen started from pole position, but was passed down the inside of the first corner by Juri Vips – the man that denied him victory late in race one – who made a flying start from fourth on the grid.

By running deep into the corner, Vips forced Nielsen and Felipe Drugovich on his outside towards the gravel trap and Fabio Scherer passed all three drivers to lead exiting Turn 2.

All that would prove academic however when the race was red-flagged to recover the car of Michael Waldherr, who was hit from behind at Turn 1 and had his rear-left wheel dislodged.

The race was restarted behind the safety car with 20 minutes to go in original grid positions, so Nielsen headed Drugovich, Scherer and Vips.

Nielsen was able to build a gap of one second early on, but he was quickly reeled back in by Drugovich, and the top four were pretty much nose-to-tail starting the final lap.

US Racing driver Nielsen held on though to win by 0.482 seconds, while his team-mate Scherer kept Prema’s Vips at bay to complete the podium.

Juan Manuel Correa climbed?to fifth after the restart but couldn’t keep pace with the drivers ahead and finished with Prema team-mate Marcus Armstrong half a second behind and Kami Laliberte a similar distance further back.

Jonathan Aberdein took eighth in front of Lirim Zendeli, who had American rookie David Malukas on his tail.

Oliver Soderstrom ended up in the Turn 1 gravel trap on the final lap after trying to go?side-by-side through the corner with Mucke team-mate Sophia Florsch, who drifted?wide after hitting the inside kerb, leaving the Swede with nowhere to go.