In the first wheel-to-wheel action of the weekend in Azerbaijan and the Baku City Circuit, Sauber Junior Team by Charouz driver Juan Manuel Correa claimed his best career result in the FIA Formula 2 category scoring his first points of the 2019 season.
After qualifying in the 17th position due to an issue found with the car, Correa avoided the melee on the opening lap, taking advantage of unfortunate circumstances of others, and drove forward to an impressive eighth place result.
In a feature event that saw the presence of the safety car on multiple occasions, the young American took advantage of restarts to advance his way forward as well as survived an off track excursion and contact from behind to secure a top-ten result. Keeping his Sauber Junior Team F2 car out of trouble, Correa was satisfied with his first event on a barrier lined street circuit but will be pushing hard to better his result in race two.
“I don’t know what to say. From one side, I am very happy. First points and we are starting second tomorrow and P8 was our goal after qualifying; but on the other side, it was such a messy race that you always have the taste in your mouth that you can probably do better because so many different scenarios happened. Feel bad for the team as well as the team missed out on scoring points with both cars due to a mechanical failure on Callum’s (Illot) car,” explained Correa.
“I am happy. We have the points and we finished the race with no incidents, which was the main priority for me. I got all the experience and everything went quite smoothly. Tomorrow we start on on the front row and that is the best thing that we could have hoped for.”
Claiming the 12th fastest lap of the race and the top result for a rookie, Correa will start from the front row after the mandatory invert of the top-eight results in race one. With the P2 starting position and the chance to attack early, Correa will be pushing for a podium result, and even more points in the second race on the weekend.
Race two on the weekend will go green on Sunday at 13:10 (GMT+4) or 5:10am (GMT-4) in the United States (New York).
Sunday’s wheel-to-wheel action with have a race distance of 21 laps and 126.063 kilometers.
Fans and followers of Juan Manuel Correa can watch live timing by visiting: http://www.fiaformula2.com/Live-Timing/Live-Timing-Inline/
Media Contact:
Raffaella Fant – Marketing Director – rfant@jmcorrea.com
Mike Maurini – Media Manager – info@RaceTechDevelopment.com
Juan Manuel Correa :
JM Correa (19) is an American-Ecuadorian F2 driver who grew up in Miami, FL and currently lives in Barcelona, Spain. Juan Manuel’s racing season will be completed with the Sauber Junior Team and he has been selected to participate in the Alfa Romeo Racing Formula 1 Team as Development Driver.
