Formula 3 graduꦿate David Beckmann caught the headlines on the opening day of Formula 2 te💃sting as he set the fastest time of the day in the afternoon session.

Beckmann’s 🥂1m42.844s was enough to beat Dan Ticktum’s top time from this morn🥃ing by just under 0.2s.

Beckman’s fastest lap was still 1.4s slower than Callum Ilott’s pole time from 2020, indicat♊ing track conditions were still far from their best. 

He makes the step up from F3 after two seasons and will drive for the Charouz Racing System in 20🐼21.

Ticktum’s 1m43.021s from the꧑ morning session wasn’t beaten by anyone else with Christian Lundgaard and Theo Pourchaire the only drivers to get within half a second of the Briton - both drivers setting their times in the afternoon.

After a yeaꦅr with DAMS, Ticktum has made the switch to Carlin in pursuit of title glory and looked to be on the pace straight awꩵay.

Felipe Drugovich was just over a second off in the lead UNI-Virtuosi ꦿas he ended the afternoon session fourth fastest. 

Juri Vips ended the afternoon in fi🌺fth, narrowly edging out Oscar Piastri for sixth.

Next up was Ma🐲rino Sato and Liam Lawson in seventh and eighth.

La♛wson enjoyed a strong morning session in the Hitech GP, ending it in second but couldn’t repeat that in the day’s second sessiꦰon.

Bent Viscaal and Guanyu Zhou com൲pleted💧 the top ten. 

Title favouꦫrite Robert Shwartzman didn’t complete many notable laps, settin༒g just 25 overall throughout the day.

Jehan Daruvala in the second Carlin enjoyed a strong start to 🙈the day as he was third in the morning but struggled to put any laps on the board come the afternoon with just six to his name.