Korea Super Prix dominated by Karthikeyan

It was a much-needed boost for Karthikeyan, who endured a difficult year in British F3 then threw away a chance to win the Macau Grand Prix a fortnight ago by crashing.
He made amends in Korea with a brace of lights-to-flag victories. In race one, he powered clear of Portugal's Tiago Monteiro to win by 3.5s to claim pole for the main event.

The big race prompted a similar performance Karthikeyan. Despite too much wheelspin off the line, he powered clear of Monteiro to control the race from the front. Karthikeyan, who will test Jaguar's F1 car in early December, said: "In the first couple of laps, my car was working very well, so I worked really hard to get the gap up to about three and a half seconds. The only problem was that on the second or third lap I hit a patch of oil and got out of shape, but other than that it was fine."

There were wildly differing fortunes for Karthikeyan's Carlin Motorsport team-mate Takuma Sato. He stalled at the start of the first race and later tangled with Britain's Ben Collins as he tried to battle back through the field. He started 18th for race two and powered through the field to finish a commendable eighth.

In the main race, Monteiro fronted a furious battle for third between Patrick Freisacher and Gianmaria Bruni. Bruni settled the issue by nudging the Austrian into a spin at the hairpin on the final lap. Freisacher recovered, but not before his rival had scrambled ahead.

Marlboro Masters winner Jonathan Cochet was out of luck after finished third in the first race, as steering failure forced him into retirement. Of the other British F3 Championship runners, Tomas Scheckter finished seventh ahead of Sato after a strong performance on an unfamiliar type of track.

Milos Pavlovic was 12th, but his RC Benetton team-mate Ben Collins suffered driveshaft failure on lap two. Manor Motorsport driver Andy Priaulx was put out of contention by accident damage in the first race and finished the main event in 16th after starting from the back of the 26-car field.

There was no joy for third Brit Derek Hayes on his F3 debut with Manor Motorsport. He was forced to miss the race after a heavy crash in qualifying damaged his car beyond repair. There were further shunts in qualifying for German drivers Robert Lechner and Pierre Kaffer, who both crashed at the same point on the circuit as Hayes. Lechner suffered heavy bruising and also missed the race.


1 Narain Karthikeyan (Dallara F300 Honda Mugen) 30m05.899s
2 Tiago Monteiro (Dallara F300 Renault Sodemo) +02.896s
3 Gianmaria Bruni (Dallara F300 Honda Mugen) +11.783s
4 Patrick Friesacher (Dallara F399 Spiess Opel) +16.218s
5 Peter Sundberg (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +19.850s
6 Andre Couto (Dallara F399 Opel Spiess) +23.494s
7 Tomas Scheckter (Dallara F399 Opel Spiess) +24.193s
8 Takuma Sato (Dallara F399 Honda Mugen) +24.745s
9 Sebastien Philippe (Dallara F399 Renault Sodemo) +26.830s
10 Enrico Toccacelo (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +27.010s
11 Shinichi Takagi (Dallara F399 Toyota TOM'S) +35.291s
12 Milos Pavlovic (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +40.639s
13 Yuji Ide (Dallara F399 Honda Mugen) +46.340s
14 Pierre Kaffer (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +46.720s
15 Haruki Kurosawa (Dallara F300 TOM'S Toyota) +49.086s
16 Andy Priaulx (Dallara F300 Mugen Honda) +49.816s
17 Paulo Montin (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +50.503s
18 Mathieu Zangarelli (Dallara F399 Sodemo Renault) +50.828s
19 Lee Ying Kin (Dallara F300 Honda Mugen) +55.126s
20 Jeroen Bleekemolen (Dallara F300 Opel Spiess) +55.761s
21 Alex Yoong (Dallara F399 Opel Spiess) +56.053s
22 Ryo Fukuda (Dallara F399 Sodemo Renault) +1 LAP