Lusail was billed as a title pressure cooker, and it delivered. There were two races, two different winners and rookie chaos cameos. By Sunday night, Leonardo Fornaroli walked away as a two time junior single seater champion.
The Chronicle Headlines
- Fornaroli Clinches Back-to-Back F3–F2 Crowns Under Lusail Lights.
- Martins controlled the Feature Race to Take his First Win Since Imola.
- Verschoor Equals the All-Time F2 Win Record With Sprint Triumph.
- Goethe Loses Pole After Impeding Penalty Shakes Up the Grid.
- Tsolov Impresses on Debut With Top-10 Sprint, P7 Qualifying and first points in the Feature Race.
Free Practice: Fornaroli sets the early tone in Lusail
Leonardo Fornaroli opened the 2025 F2 Qatar Grand Prix weekend exactly as a champion elect should. The Invicta driver ended Free Practice on top with a 1:38.656. He found a late lap sweet spot on the hard tyre as the Lusail surface finally began to rubber in.
Behind him, Dino Beganovic led Hitech’s charge in P2, just over a tenth back, with Alexander Dunne slotting Rodin into third. Luke Browning and Roman Stanek completed a top five covered by less than four tenths, while title contender Richard Verschoor was seventh, quietly logging long-run data rather than chasing purple sectors. The message was clear: Invicta arrived sharp, Hitech matched them for one-lap pace, and Verschoor was playing the long game.
Qualifying: Goethe’s pole, Fornaroli’s title control
Qualifying belonged, on pure speed, to Oliver Goethe. The Campos driver hooked up the night-time conditions and took pole with a late lap, edging Leonardo Fornaroli and Victor Martins on a track that was ramping up by the minute.
Behind them, Crawford had to settle for the third row. That already tilted the title maths toward Fornaroli, who only needed to shadow his closest rival to protect a healthy points cushion.
The twist came after the session. Goethe picked up a three-place grid penalty for impeding, which promoted Fornaroli to Feature Race pole and moved Martins to the front row.
For Invicta, it was the ideal scenario for the Qatar GP 2025: track position for their lead driver and a direct title rival shuffled backwards.
We can also note that F2 debutant Tsolov managed to secure P7 in qualifying, an impressive start during one of the season’s most demanding weekends.
Sprint Race: Verschoor times it right, title fight tightens
The Sprint at the 2025 F2 Qatar Grand Prix belonged to Richard Verschoor. The MP Motorsport driver converted reverse-grid pole into his eighth Formula 2 victory, equalling the all-time series win record and dragging his title hopes a little further down the road.
He did not have it all his own way though. Joshua Duerksen launched better from the front row and briefly stole the lead. But once DRS came alive Verschoor took back control into Turn 1 and started edging clear. Behind them, Nikola Tsolov ran an outstanding debut race in P3, only for two Safety Car periods to spoil the party. The first was for contact between Laurens van Hoepen and James Wharton, then for Cian Shields’ spin to reset the field.
On the final lap, chaos arrived. Rafael Villagómez dived past Tsolov for the podium, ran wide, and still emerged ahead, while the Bulgarian rookie slid off and tumbled to 10th. At the flag it was Verschoor from Duerksen and Villagómez, with Sebastián Montoya, Dunne, Fornaroli, Martinius Stenshorne and Jak Crawford completing the points. The standings tightened but did not flip: Fornaroli stayed in control on 191 points, ahead of Crawford on 170, Verschoor on 162 and Browning on 161.
Feature Race: Martins victorious as Fornaroli seals the crown
The Lusail Feature Race delivered exactly what a title decider should. There was tension on the grid, chaos in the middle, and a champion crowned under the floodlights. Victor Martins made the sharpest start, beating Leonardo Fornaroli off the line and slicing across to defend Turn 1. The ART driver controlled the race from that moment onward. He managed tyre warm-up, nailed both restarts and kept the Invicta car at arm’s length even as the strategies began to diverge.
Fornaroli, starting from the front row, never needed to win, he just needed to keep the numbers on his side. He pitted early with Alexander Dunne and a pack of hard-tyre runners, then spent most of the race measuring risk versus reward instead of forcing overtakes. Once the early-stoppers cycled through, he emerged back in a net P2 with a gap that was stable, if not comfortable.
A mid race Safety Car for Oliver Goethe’s stoppage reshuffled the board. It dragged the alternate strategy runners, Dino Beganovic, Luke Browning and John Bennett, into temporary contention. But once they boxed, the rhythm reset: Martins out front, Fornaroli stalking, and Dunne executing a tidy defensive drive to secure P3 and another crucial podium in his late-season surge.
Behind them, Arvid Lindblad held fourth. He faced a post-race investigation for allegedly running too slow under the Safety Car. But stewards examined the data and confirmed he had remained within the minimum delta, allowing him to keep the position. Montoya, Verschoor, Tsolov, Stanek, Beganovic, and Browning completed the top ten.
Fornaroli: back-to-back champion at 20
Leonardo Fornaroli’s coronation felt less like a surprise and more like the final line in a season long argument. Second place in Lusail was enough for the Invicta Racing driver to clinch the 2025 FIA Formula 2 title with one round to spare, twelve months after taking the Formula 3 crown in 2024.
In the press conference he admitted the scale of the step.
“It sounds amazing. I did not have many expectations because it was a new car and my first time working with an English team.”
Invicta’s structure and the presence of Roman Stanek as an experienced team mate gave him a stable base. Four wins, nine podiums and two pole positions turned that foundation into a championship platform.
Fornaroli has never pretended the year was flawless.
“For sure, there were some mistakes I could have avoided, but it is part of the game. The championship is very competitive.”
That mindset matches his 2024 Formula 3 story. There, he won the title without a single race victory by scoring relentlessly rather than swinging for glory every weekend.
What changes now is the company he keeps.
“Well, it is a big emotion, knowing that I am doing the same that the top F1 guys did like Oscar, Charles, Russell and Gabriel. To get two championships in a row is amazing. This one feels even better than the first because it was in my first year.”
Back to back titles in Formula 3 and Formula 2, completed at the 2025 F2 Qatar Grand Prix, put Fornaroli straight into the talent pipeline that produced Piastri, Leclerc, Russell and Bortoleto. The only open question is whether Formula 1 makes room for him fast enough.
What next? – Abu Dhabi finale
The 2025 F2 Qatar Grand Prix settles the drivers’ fight but leaves the teams’ championship wide open. Invicta Racing leave Lusail on 296 points, with Hitech TGR on 261 and Campos Racing still in range on 239. Yas Marina will decide which squad signs off as champions. All three have cars capable of winning on the day. The final weekend is no longer about crowning Leonardo Fornaroli. Instead, it is about which operation can execute one last clean double header under the Abu Dhabi lights.
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Formula 2 returns December 5th in Abu Dhabi.
Feature Image Credit: Formula Motorsport Ltd