Red Bull-nominated driver Alisha Palmowski claimed her maiden F1 Academy victory in Shanghai in glorious fashion, inheriting a last-lap lead from Nina Gademan.
She proved victorious in her first F1 Academy appearance despite a chaotic race with three full Safety Cars and the retirement of three drivers.
Palmowski’s teammate Chloe Chambers finished in second place after holding off Ferrari Academy driver Maya Weug, who rounded off the podium in third place.
Although Ferrari’s Weug qualified on pole position, F1 Academy introduced reverse-grid qualifying for Race 1, putting Nina Gademan on the front row.
Polesitter Gademan got off to a great start, leading the pack heading into Turn 1 while chaos unfolded behind as Emma Felbermayr lost a position around Turn 3 to Palmowski.
Red Bull Ford driver Chambers had an amazing launch down the starting straight, jumping up one position as she put severe pressure on Felbermayr.
The two fastest qualifiers Weug and Doriane Pin also gained positions on the opening lap, with the Ducthwoman climbing up to fifth and the Mercedes Junior Driver to sixth.
Wild Card driver Shi Wei brought out a yellow flag on Turn 7 after spinning and beaching her Hitech-operated car in the gravel.
A full Safety Car was brought out on Lap 2 as Shi retired from the 13-lap race in her first F1 Academy appearance in Shanghai.
The Safety Car followed the drivers around the Shanghai International Circuit until Turn 14 on Lap 4 as Wei’s car had to be removed from the middle of the track.
Gademan launched herself quickly away from the rest of the pack as the second runner Palmowski tailed her into the last corner.
A battle unfolded behind between Weug and Felbermayr, where the latter was forced to defend from the Ferrari Academy driver.
The Kick Sauber driver lost the fourth-place position to Weug on the opening of Lap 5 and was also jumped by Iron Dame Doriane Pin.
Pin carefully tailed her rival Weug throughout the first sector of Lap 5 and took advantage of Weug’s attack on Felbermayr to climb up to fifth place.
Another Safety Car was brought out on Lap 5 as Aurelia Nobels made contact with teammate Lia Block heading into Turn 6.
The race directors noted the incident as Block pinched the rear of her teammate’s car on the entry of Turn 6.
The Safety Car ended on Lap 8, but another yellow flag was waved in Sector 1 shortly after as Nicole Havrda spun out of the first corner.
Chloe Chong, who was following behind Havrda, picked up some damage during the incident as Havrda slowed down in the entry to the first corner.
A third Safety Car was brought into the opening F1 Academy race until Lap 10, which gave the pack three laps of racing.
Front-runner Gademan had a perfect restart once again, leading the grid through Turn 1 as Weug set her sights on a podium position.
The Alpine-nominated driver started to pull away from Palmowski running in second place, running 0.5s ahead of the Red Bull driver.
This was until Gademan started to slow down on track, tumbling from the lead to 14th place on Lap 12 with a suspected technical issue.
Palmowski inherited the lead and made an attempt to break away from Chambers while Weug and Pin climbed up to third and fourth place.
A brief battle unfolded between the two teammates, Chambers and Palmowski on the final lap but it was the Red Bull driver who proved victorious.
Chambers came home a close runner-up as Weug rounded off the podium.
More chaos took place on the last lap as Pin locked up at the end of the back straight, but it was nothing compared to Hausmann who was beached on the last corner.
Pin finished ahead of Rafaela Ferreira who scored a fifth-place finish in her F1 Academy debut, while fellow rookie Ella Lloyd claimed sixth place.
Alba Larsen grabbed seventh place from Aiva Anagnostiadis who finished in eighth place ahead of Block who managed to climb nine positions in the race.
Chong rounded off the top-10.
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