In Azerbaijan, the Brazilian driver came in second and fourth place and scored 24 points
The second round of the F2 World Championship finished on Sunday (29). The races took place on the Baku street circuit in Azerbaijan and witnessed the Brazilian driver Sérgio Sette Câmara’s (YOUSE | Banco BMG | MRV | CCR | CEMIG | GASMIG | Usiminas) return to the podium. Getting a fourth place in the race on Saturday and a second place on Sunday, the young man took over the vice-leadership of the Championship and is only one point away from the leader.
The weekend in Baku started very positively for Sette Câmara. He could not hide the fact the he really likes street circuits and was very excited for this round and, right away, showed that he was very comfortable in this long track of more than six kilometers. In the only free practice of the round, held on Friday morning, the driver recorded the fastest time with the mark of 1m57s136 which made him feel confident for the qualifiers that would follow next.
A few hours later, still on Friday, it was the time for the qualifiers. Sergio was focused and knew he needed a perfect lap, but, still with the first set of tyres, he felt some trouble with his car. With the second set of tyres he did a lap of 1m55s212 and got the fifth place. Sérgio remained on the track and was doing a great lap when a red flag closed the session prematurely, and thus Sette had to settle for the starting position in the third row of the grid.
The first race of the round was on Saturday morning. In a conservative start Sette Câmara remained in fifth position and, still in the first lap, he ended up being overtaken by another competitor, which left him in sixth place. With super soft tyres. the Carlin team driver wasn’t performing the way he hoped to, but he was not let down. He set a strong rhythm and maintained the sixth place until lap eight, when he stopped for the pit stop. His stop took some time and after all the round of pits, the driver was in the eighth position. Keeping a fast pace, the driver started to get closer to the competitors and in the middle of the race he took the seventh place. After 20 laps a safety car regrouped the cars and, in the restart, Sérgio was incredible. In a perfect re-acceleration the driver took advantage of a confusion of cars in front of him and jumped to the third place. Still with four laps to the go, Serginho was in the third position, but, pressured by Antonio Fuoco he ended up being overtaken and finished the race in the fourth place.
Following the inversion of the first eight places for the grid formation for the second race, Sette Câmara lined up his car on Sunday once again in fifth place. After a good start the driver soon jumped to third place and, in the second corner, went second after passing Lando Norris, his teammate. Very fast, at the end of the first lap he, Sette Câmara, took the lead in a perfect maneuver. The Brazilian didn’t take long to open a lead and, with three laps completed, he was already two seconds ahead. Taking advantage of the fights behind him by middle of the race the driver had a 4-second-lead. At this point Englishman George Russel took the second place. With a better balanced equipment and better tyres, the competitor imposed a very strong pace and, with each lap, took about eight tenths of a second compared to the Brazilian. With four laps to go, however, Sergio could not withstand the attacks and gave up the lead. Certain of the importance of this race for the Championship the driver from Belo Horizonte managed to remain in second place and, after the 21 laps, he received the flag guaranteeing his third podium in four races.
After the first four stages of the Championship Sérgio Sette Câmara is the vice-leader of the Championship with 52 points, one less than his teammate. The next round of the F2 World Championship will be in Barcelona, Spain, between May 11 and 13.