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Abu Dhabi GP2: Alexander Rossi gets pole as Marcus Ericsson demoted

Marcus Ericsson has been stripped of his Abu Dhabi GP2 pole position after stewards ruled that he exceeded track limits on his best qualifying lap

The decision to penalise the DAMS driver promotes Caterham's Alexander Rossi to his first pole position in the category.

It also moves title contender Sam Bird to a front row starting position as he bids to overhaul Fabio Leimer's seven-point series lead.

Leimer will now start fourth, behind Jolyon Palmer, with Tom Dillmann and Johnny Cecotto Jr rounding out the new top six.

Ericsson falls to 12th place with his second-best time.

His drop moves outside title contender Felipe Nasr up to eighth.

Stefano Coletti, the other man still in the championship fight, was only 18th quickest.

James Calado was ruled out of contention when he was given a five-place grid penalty for an incident with Dillmann in practice.

That meant he could not get the pole bonus points required to keep his title bid alive. Calado was only 14th in qualifying in any case.

Further back on the grid, Daniel Abt and Gianmarco Raimondo have both been penalised three places each for blocking Rossi and Calado respectively. The will start from the final row, with Abt starting ahead of Raimondo (who had qualified last anyway).

Pos  Driver               Team                Time       Gap
 1.  Alexander Rossi      Caterham            1m48.931s
 2.  Sam Bird             Russian Time        1m49.241s  +0.310s
 3.  Jolyon Palmer        Carlin              1m49.376s  +0.445s
 4.  Fabio Leimer         Racing Engineering  1m49.485s  +0.554s
 5.  Tom Dillmann         Russian Time        1m49.672s  +0.741s
 6.  Johnny Cecotto Jr    Arden               1m49.680s  +0.749s
 7.  Jon Lancaster        Hilmer              1m49.827s  +0.896s
 8.  Felipe Nasr          Carlin              1m49.829s  +0.898s
 9.  Stephane Richelmi    DAMS                1m49.835s  +0.904s
10.  Dani Clos            MP                  1m49.846s  +0.915s
11.  Mitch Evans          Arden               1m49.864s  +0.933s
12.  Marcus Ericsson      DAMS                1m49.910s  +0.979s
13.  Sergio Canamasas     Caterham            1m49.951s  +1.020s
14.  James Calado*        ART                 1m50.002s  +1.071s
15.  Rio Haryanto         Addax               1m50.334s  +1.403s
16.  Nathanael Berthon    Trident             1m50.446s  +1.515s
17.  Adrian Quaife-Hobbs  Hilmer              1m50.510s  +1.579s
18.  Stefano Coletti      Rapax               1m50.534s  +1.603s
19.  Julian Leal          Racing Engineering  1m50.553s  +1.622s
20.  Simon Trummer        Rapax               1m50.634s  +1.703s
21.  Jake Rosenzweig      Addax               1m50.809s  +1.878s
22.  Rene Binder          Lazarus             1m50.884s  +1.953s
23.  Daniel de Jong       MP                  1m50.906s  +1.975s
24.  Daniel Abt**         ART                 1m50.907s  +1.976s
25.  Vittorio Ghirelli    Lazarus             1m51.493s  +2.562s
26.  Gianmarco Raimondo   Trident             1m52.311s  +3.380s


*Will drop to 19th with grid penalty
**Will drop to 25th with grid penalty

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