Car
Why Formula 2 drivers can stall on the grid
by Josh Suttill
3min read
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The 2025 Imola Formula 2 feature race saw two of the top three drivers on the grid - Sebastian Montoya and Victor Martins - stall before the race had got underway.
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On the formation lap, Prema’s Montoya stalled from his first F2 feature race front row start, and he had to be pushed off the grid before the start of the race - instead starting from the pitlane.
Then, on the race start proper, ART Grand Prix driver Martins stalled on the grid from third place (essentially second with Montoya’s P2 grid spot left vacant).
He had to be pushed off the grid and rejoined the race just ahead of the leaders, almost a full lap down.
That denied Martins a chance to take the F2 championship lead, after he had shown good pace in Saturday’s sprint race, and eliminated two frontrunners before the race had properly begun.
It's not the first time we've seen an F2 driver stall on the grid, with the most famous recent example being then-championship contender Isack Hadjar stalling on the grid in the feature race in the 2024 Abu Dhabi title decider.
Victor Martins on the grid at Imola with his team changing the ART Grand Prix’s tyres
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How the driver starts an F2 car
A driver has clutch paddles that they use off the start line. There are two paddles located on the lower back of the steering wheel, beneath the gear shift paddles.
Drivers typically hold both clutch paddles at the start, releasing one of them immediately and holding the other paddle to a chosen bite point, determined pre-race by their team.
That bite point is crucial to drivers getting a good start. Every team and driver will try and push that bite point to the limit in order to get an advantage off the start.
That chosen bite point can be adjusted via a clutch positioning bite point dial on the front of the steering wheel.
The throttle map dial on the front of the steering wheel also needs to be adjusted to ‘start’ before the race.
Drivers can be penalised if they don’t follow the correct start set-up procedure, with Kush Maini disqualified from the 2024 Azerbaijan feature race at Baku for failing to follow the correct start set-up procedure dictated in F2’s System User Manual - an error that led to a huge start-line crash that sent Pepe Marti’s Campos Racing car upside down.
The aftermath of Kush Maini’s crash at the start of the 2024 Azerbaijan Formula 2 feature race
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How difficult is starting an F2 car?
So, are the F2 cars especially difficult for the driver to get off the start line? Imola feature race winner Alex Dunne of Rodin Motorsport doesn’t think so.
“I’m not going to say it’s not difficult because then I’ll probably end up stalling next time I drive the car! But so far to be honest, I haven’t had any issues yet, touch wood, I don’t have any in the future.” Dunne said when asked by Raceteq.
“Naturally, the teams always set it up in a way that you get the best start possible. I think sometimes that’s probably closer to the limit.
“But no, I think it is a lot of the time, when you stall, it’s more about the clutch position, I think it’s very rare that you stall because a driver has done something wrong.
“I think that’s something I haven’t found or experienced yet at least, but of course it’s very unfortunate for them.”
Alex Dunne won the feature race at Imola for Rodin Motorsport
Second place finisher Luke Browning (Hitech) agreed that stalling on the grid is rarely as a result of driver error.
“It’s unfortunate for them guys,” Browning said.
“The way the start works is that you have two clutch paddles and you drop one to a certain bite point, it’s like a fixed number that the team sets: they choose the percentage, [if it is a] bit too aggressive when the driver drops the clutch paddle, it is what it is, he’s going to stall.
“I doubt any fault of the drivers. That’s what you’ve got to work on before FP, qualifying, and practice starts you’ve done throughout the year to try and get as close to the limit as possible of stalling, because naturally that’s the quickest way, but also be consistent and not risking stalling, so that’s what it is.”
Montoya still mounted an impressive recovery to score four points for an eighth place finish while Martins climbed from last to 12th in the 2025 Imola feature race.
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