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Estoril Auto GP: Tamas Pal Kiss seals runner-up spot with win

Tamas Pal Kiss took a well-judged victory in the first Auto GP race at Estoril

It was the Hungarian's third win of the 2014 season, and his second with the Virtuosi UK squad.

The win confirmed Kiss as the series runner-up behind Kimiya Sato, who was crowned champion at the Nurburgring in August and is not contesting the finale.

The race began under some confusion as an apparently clean initial start was red-flagged due to what appeared to be a procedural issue involving the medical car at the back of the grid.

The cars made the second start under safety car, with Kiss leading away and soon opening up a four-second gap.

Behind Kiss, ex-Formula 1 racer Antonio Pizzonia used all of his experience at the restart to sweep ahead of 2013 Auto GP champion Vittorio Ghirelli, but struggled to latch on to Kiss and mount any serious challenge.

When Pizzonia's Zele Racing team struggled to detach his right rear tyre during the mandatory pitstop, the Brazilian fell back to fourth position behind Ghirelli and Markus Pommer, who filled out the podium.

Andrea Roda had a lonely race to finish in fifth, while Shinya Michimi's race was spoiled by a drive through penalty for speeding in the pitlane during his pitstop.

The only retirement was Francesco Dracone, who broke his Super Nova car's right rear suspension after a tangle with Luis Sa Silva's Zele Racing Lola exiting Turn 1.

Sa Silva managed to survive the contact unscathed but struggled thereafter with an ill-handling car, despite leading briefly during the pitstop period.

RESULTS - 24 LAPS:

Pos Driver Team Gap
1 Tamas Pal Kiss Virtuosi UK 51m00.058s
2 Vittorio Ghirelli Supernova International 4.094s
3 Markus Pommer Supernova International 6.446s
4 Antonio Pizzonia Zele Racing 10.262s
5 Andrea Roda Virtuosi UK 24.546s
6 Shinya Michimi Euronova Racing 43.945s
7 Luis Jorge Sa Silva Zele Racing 46.354s
8 Michele La Rosa MLR 71 by Euronova 1 Lap
9 Salvatore De Plano FMS Racing 1 Lap
- Francesco Dracone Supernova International Retirement


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