Marcus Armstrong fastest on final morning of Bahrain F2 test

The DAMS driver lit up the timing screens just before the half hour mark with a 1m42.173s effort, which eclipsed the previous benchmark posted by fellow New Zealander Liam Lawson (Hitech Grand Prix) at the Sakhir Circuit.

Following a similar pattern to Tuesday, teams and drivers focussed largely on qualifying simulations in the morning outing, although Armstrong’s session best was 0.4s adrift of Christian Lundgaard’s time which remains the fastest of the test to date.

The top two remained unchanged in the final 90 minutes as F2 rookie Lawson sat second as the chequered flag flew, just 0.045s shy of Armstrong.

Juri Vips completed a strong showing for Hitech Grand Prix in third with the Estonian a mere six thousandths of a second slower than his teammate Lawson.

Guanyu Zhou (UNI Virtuosi) ended the session in fourth, albeit within a tenth of Armstrong, having recorded the equal most mileage in the outing, logging 47 laps in total.

MP Motorsport’s Lirim Zendeli was fifth, just three thousandths faster than Prema Racing’s Robert Shwartzman, as 0.186s covered the top six in what proved to be the closest session so far.

Ralph Boschung was the top Campos Racing runner in seventh as Richard Verschoor (MP Motorsport), FIA Formula 3 champion Oscar Piastri (Prema Racing) and Felipe Drugovich (UNI Virtuosi) completed the top 10.

Tuesday’s pacesetters Lundgaard (ART Grand Prix) and Dan Ticktum (Carlin) found themselves in 14th and 20th respectively.

Ticktum’s teammate Jehan Daruvala, who was second fastest yesterday afternoon, was a tenth further back in 21st position.

Only a short red flag stoppage after the halfway mark interrupted the session as the entire field completed valuable mileage.

A total of 690 laps were completed with Vips' 13 laps the lowest amount undertaken by any one driver.

Teams will be back in action later today for the final session of the test which concludes at 2pm GMT.

The F2 paddock will then reconvene at the same venue for the season opener on 26-28 March.

Results:

Pos	Time	Laps	Driver	Team
1	1'42.173	22	Marcus Armstrong	DAMS
2	1'42.218	13	Liam Lawson	Hitech Grand Prix
3	1'42.224	36	Jüri Vips	Hitech Grand Prix
4	1'42.234	47	Guanyu Zhou	UNI-Virtuosi
5	1'42.356	22	Lirim Zendeli	MP Motorsport
6	1'42.359	20	Robert Shwartzman	Prema Racing
7	1'42.427	23	Ralph Boschung	Campos Racing
8	1'42.522	24	Richard Verschoor	MP Motorsport
9	1'42.527	22	Oscar Piastri	Prema Racing
10	1'42.570	45	Felipe Drugovich	UNI-Virtuosi
11	1'42.587	48	David Beckmann	Charouz Racing System
12	1'42.590	25	Roy Nissany	DAMS
13	1'42.595	40	Théo Pourchaire	ART Grand Prix
14	1'42.674	40	Christian Lundgaard	ART Grand Prix
15	1'42.815	34	Bent Viscaal	Trident
16	1'42.920	43	Marino Sato	Trident
17	1'43.159	31	Matteo Nannini	HWA Racelab
18	1'43.219	24	Gianluca Petecof	Campos Racing
19	1'43.283	47	Guilherme Samaia	Charouz Racing System
20	1'43.496	24	Dan Ticktum	Carlin
21	1'43.585	24	Jehan Daruvala	Carlin
22	1'45.076	36	Alessio Deledda	HWA Racelab