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The opening race of the third round of the F4 Central European Zone Championship at Slovakia Ring delivered plenty of action and an almost photo-finish, as Jenzer Motorsport’s Teo Borenstein beat Simon Rechenmacher from Cram Motorsport by just 0.105 seconds. However, following an incident involving Rechenmacher and Mathilda Paatz after the restart, Rechenmacher was handed a 10-second penalty by the race stewards.

Borenstein started from pole position alongside Rechenmacher, with Elia Weiss and Mathilda Paatz lining up on the second row. The third row featured Markas Silkunas and Antonio Errigo, while Georgiy Zasov and Erik Poulsen occupied the fourth row. Mio Olert and Francesco Pio Coppola started from the fifth row in the 20-car field.

During the formation lap, Benett Gaspar came to a halt in Sector 2 and had to be recovered, forcing the field to complete an additional formation lap before the race could get underway.

Borenstein made the best start, but Weiss got away even better and attempted to pass his team-mate around the outside of Turn 1. The move proved unsuccessful and Weiss dropped to fourth place.

During the opening lap, Alexandre Louza and Igor Polak made contact and both ended up in the gravel trap, prompting the deployment of the safety car.

The order under the safety car was Borenstein, Paatz, Rechenmacher, Weiss, Silkunas, Errigo, Olert, Coppola, Orcholski and Bruno completing the top ten. It took some time to recover the stranded cars, with the race resuming with 11 minutes remaining on the clock.

Borenstein retained the lead at the restart, but Paatz immediately came under pressure from Rechenmacher Their accident resulted in Paatz spinning dramatically on the start-finish straight. Fortunately, despite the dangerous position of her car, she avoided contact from the pack and was able to continue, albeit at the back of the field.

The incident promoted Weiss to second place ahead of Rechenmacher, while Silkunas and Errigo moved up to fourth and fifth respectively.

At the front, Borenstein managed to build a gap of around one second while Rechenmacher repeatedly attacked Weiss before finally taking second place at the end of lap five.

The leading four cars gradually pulled clear, opening a four-second advantage over the next group, headed by Errigo, Olert, Orcholski, Coppola, Gorcica and Poulsen. The standout performer in that pack was Orcholski, who is making his F4 CEZ debut this weekend and impressed with a strong drive.

On the final lap, Rechenmacher was tucked right under the rear wing of Borenstein as the pair battled for victory. Rechenmacher pushed hard and used the slipstream out of the final corner, but ultimately fell short by just 0.105 seconds.

But later on received ten second penalty and dropped to fourth Weiss and Silkunas. Orcholski secured an impressive fifth place on his debut. Errigo crossed the line sixth, followed by Gorcica, Poulsen and Zasov. Olert completed the top ten.

FIA F4 CEZ – Race 1 – Official

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