Alpine academy driver Abbi Pulling led every lap to claim her second consecutive F1 Academy victory at the Miami International Autodrome.
Pulling led Mercedes junior Doriane Pin home by five seconds to extend her early championship advantage.Haas-supported driver Chloe Chambers joined them on the podium, scoring her first rostrum finish in the series at her home race by just a tenth of a second from Maya Weug. The Ferrari academy driver applied fierce pressure over the final laps.
Pulling held onto the lead at the start and never allowed Pin to put her under pressure over the 13 laps to take her second consecutive win. This was her first time leading a race this year, Pulling having inherited victory in the second race in Jeddah from Pin due to a post-race penalty.
Weug later lost her fourth place after a five-second penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage, promoting Nerea Marti into the position with Hamda Al Qubaisi in fifth despite running third for most of the race before fading. Jessica Edgar took seventh place ahead of Amna Al Qubaisi with McLaren junior Bianca Bustamante taking ninth despite stalling at the start and getting a five-second time penalty for cutting the chicane and gaining an advantage.
Bustamante also claimed the bonus point for fastest lap, while Lola Lovinfosse took the final point in tenth.
Tina Hausmann was the only retirement from the race after crashing out on the opening lap at the long right hand corner of turn 12 following contact with Aurelia Nobels.
Pulling has pole for the second race which will take place before the grand prix on Sunday.
Race results
| Position | Car | Driver | Team |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 9 | Abbi Pulling | Rodin |
| 2 | 28 | Doriane Pin | Prema |
| 3 | 14 | Chloe Chambers | Campos |
| 4 | 30 | Nerea Marti | Campos |
| 5 | 8 | Hamda Al Qubaisi | MP |
| 6 | 64 | Maya Weug | Prema |
| 7 | 17 | Jessica Edgar | Rodin |
| 8 | 88 | Amna Al Qubaisi | MP |
| 9 | 16 | Bianca Bustamante | ART |
| 10 | 3 | Lola Lovinfosse | Rodin |
| 11 | 7 | Emely De Heus | MP |
| 12 | 15 | Carrie Schreiner | Campos |
| 13 | 22 | Aurelia Nobels | ART |
| 14 | 77 | Courtney Crone | Prema |
| 15 | 57 | Lia Block | ART |
| DNF | 19 | Tina Hausmann | Prema |
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F1 Academy
- Alpine’s Pulling completes Miami sweep with dominant second race win
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- Pin loses win to Pulling after penalty for taking chequered flag twice
- Pin’s second win in jeopardy after bizarre finish
- Pin converts pole to victory to win opening F1 Academy race from Pulling
Senproman
4th May 2024, 21:10
Abbi and Pin showing their class above the rest again.
Though Abbi pulling a lead of 5+ seconds over Pin was quite impressive.
Still not a fan of Nicky on commentary, utterly diabolical!
amped
5th May 2024, 0:51
The problem is, despite being class of the field in F1 Academy, Pulling was poor in British F4 only last weekend. In both races she slipped down from her starting positions which highlights the gap in performance levels between F1 Academy and actual F4 series.
It really is just a second tier series of drivers that don’t achieve a whole lot in F4 and only progress beyond if someone writes a huge cheque to buy a drive in a higher series that is far from justified. Most of the drivers can’t blame inexperience either, they have done plenty of racing just haven’t done well when doing so.
As for Nicki Shields, she is a reporter/presenter so I’m not quite sure why they decided to put her in commentary. It is a very different role. F1 Management evidently just wants to repeat the same mistakes the incompetent W Series managers did when they hired Claire Cottingham and replaced her for the second year.
senproman
5th May 2024, 4:12
Claire did a leagues better job of it than Nicky is right now.
Though to be fair, I don’t rate Nicky as a reporter or presenter, either. I didn’t like her when she was lead presenter in Formula E years ago either.