Romain Grosjean has come out on top in an extraordinarily chaotic race one this afternoon, beating the elements and the rest of the field to win from Alvaro Parente and Andreas Zuber to put himself third in the championship on an afternoon when the main title rivals Giorgio Pantano and Bruno Senna failed to score a point despite running first and second after the pitstop period.
Senna was leading ahead of Parente, before his pit stop. Unfortunately for the Brazlian, his team released him into the path of Alberto Valerio, with a bitter-tasting drive through penalty the only possible result.
His penalty was delayed by a safety car period, following Davide Valsechi's heavy crash, Senna was leading ahead of Pantano. But the Italian suddenly fell backwards down the order, a possible result of the anti-stall device cutting in before getting back underway in P10.
At the restart Grosjean outdragged Zuber on the top straight for third place, and when Senna came in for his drive through the lead was handed to Parente, but the Portuguese driver's mirrors were full of the red and white car of Grosjean.
Despite Parente's strong drive it was only a matter of time before he lost the lead, and on lap 20 Grosjean outdragged him along the front straight before cutting inside at La Source and into a lead that he never looked like relinquishing.
Pantano had moved up to eighth when he miscalculated his line into La Source and spun on the kerbs just as Valerio spun into the wall on the opposite side of the track, prompting another safety car period and another mistake by Pantano as he locked up and plowed straight into Lucas di Grassi.
After the race, Giorgio Pantano was excluded from the Spa-Francorchamps event after the stewards have considered that he caused a collision with Lucas di Grassi on the last lap through "reckless driving and unsportsmanlike behaviour" which ended the Campos man's participation in the race.
In addition, in a separate incident, it was shown that Pantano overtook whilst the safety car was deployed. As a consequence, it has been decided that the Racing Engineering driver was excluded from this Event, including classification in Race 1.
Andreas Zuber was disqualified after Race 1 when unauthorised repairs to his Piquet Sports car were noted. Third place thus goes to his teammate Pastor Maldonado, and Jérôme d'Ambrosio will start from the reversed-grid pole position in tomorrow's sprint race while Zuber will start last.
Race 1 classification :
1 - Romain Grosjean - ART - 26 laps
2 - Alvaro Parente - Super Nova - + 4"139
3 - Pastor Maldonado - Piquet - + 6"308
4 - Vitaly Petrov - Campos - + 6"783
5 - Sebastien Buemi - Arden - + 8"711
6 - Andy Soucek - Super Nova - + 8"939
7 - Mike Conway - Trident - + 9"549
8 - Jerome D'Ambrosio - Dams - + 10"846
Etc.
Senna was leading ahead of Parente, before his pit stop. Unfortunately for the Brazlian, his team released him into the path of Alberto Valerio, with a bitter-tasting drive through penalty the only possible result.
His penalty was delayed by a safety car period, following Davide Valsechi's heavy crash, Senna was leading ahead of Pantano. But the Italian suddenly fell backwards down the order, a possible result of the anti-stall device cutting in before getting back underway in P10.
At the restart Grosjean outdragged Zuber on the top straight for third place, and when Senna came in for his drive through the lead was handed to Parente, but the Portuguese driver's mirrors were full of the red and white car of Grosjean.
Despite Parente's strong drive it was only a matter of time before he lost the lead, and on lap 20 Grosjean outdragged him along the front straight before cutting inside at La Source and into a lead that he never looked like relinquishing.
Pantano had moved up to eighth when he miscalculated his line into La Source and spun on the kerbs just as Valerio spun into the wall on the opposite side of the track, prompting another safety car period and another mistake by Pantano as he locked up and plowed straight into Lucas di Grassi.
After the race, Giorgio Pantano was excluded from the Spa-Francorchamps event after the stewards have considered that he caused a collision with Lucas di Grassi on the last lap through "reckless driving and unsportsmanlike behaviour" which ended the Campos man's participation in the race.
In addition, in a separate incident, it was shown that Pantano overtook whilst the safety car was deployed. As a consequence, it has been decided that the Racing Engineering driver was excluded from this Event, including classification in Race 1.
Andreas Zuber was disqualified after Race 1 when unauthorised repairs to his Piquet Sports car were noted. Third place thus goes to his teammate Pastor Maldonado, and Jérôme d'Ambrosio will start from the reversed-grid pole position in tomorrow's sprint race while Zuber will start last.
Race 1 classification :
1 - Romain Grosjean - ART - 26 laps
2 - Alvaro Parente - Super Nova - + 4"139
3 - Pastor Maldonado - Piquet - + 6"308
4 - Vitaly Petrov - Campos - + 6"783
5 - Sebastien Buemi - Arden - + 8"711
6 - Andy Soucek - Super Nova - + 8"939
7 - Mike Conway - Trident - + 9"549
8 - Jerome D'Ambrosio - Dams - + 10"846
Etc.