Maldonado wins race one

Britain's Ben Hanley scored his best result of the season to finish second, just three and a half seconds adrift.

Maldonado has looked in command of proceedings throughout the meeting, and set fastest lap for good measure.

"This is a really special weekend," said Maldonado, "the team (Draco) are Italian and I have spent a lot of time in Italy racing Italian Formula Renault, it's really been like a home race."

Sebastian Vettel finished a classy third on his debut in the World Series, after making an opportunistic passing manoeuvre on Andy Soucek on the opening lap. Soucek had been attempting to pass Hanley on the back straight, and when the move failed to come off Vettel seized the chance and leapt by. Vettel remained ahead of Soucek to the flag, as the twisty Misano track offered little in the way of passing opportunities.

Alvaro Parente finished fifth for Victory Engineering, ahead of Borja Garcia. Garcia was the main beneficiary of a three car incident, which eliminated Sean McIntosh, Davide Valsecchi and local hero Christian Montanari.

The extra championship points Garcia received as a result of moving up the order may soften the blow of relinquishing the lead in the title race to Maldonado.

Results:

Pos  Driver              Team                    Time
 1.  Pastor Maldonado    Draco              30:04.444
 2.  Ben Hanley          Cram                 + 3.431
 3.  Sebastian Vettel    Carlin               + 6.715
 4.  Andy Soucek         Interwetten         + 14.189
 5.  Alvaro Parente      Victory             + 14.612
 6.  Borja Garcia        RC                  + 26.198
 7.  Alx Danielsson      Comtec              + 26.619
 8.  Michael Aleshin     Carlin              + 28.887
 9.  Enrico Toccacelo    EuroInternational   + 30.571
10.  James Rossiter      Pons                + 31.138
11.  Robbie Kerr         KTR                 + 31.799
12.  Gregory Franchi     Prema               + 32.669
13.  Ryo Fukuda          Tech 1              + 34.167
14.  Celso Miguez        Pons                + 37.427
15.  Steven Kane         Epsilon Euskadi     + 40.435
16.  Patrick Pilet       GD                  + 40.885
17.  Jerome D'Ambrosio   Tech 1              + 42.752
18.  Milos Pavlovic      Cram                + 44.882
19.  Matteo Meneghello   GD                  + 45.459
20.  Alessandro Bonetti  Jenzer              + 45.995
21.  Tomas Kostka        Draco               + 47.709
22.  Bruce Jouanny       RC                  + 55.469
23.  Eric Salignon       Interwetten          + 1 lap

NOT CLASSIFIED:

     Sean McIntosh       KTR                 + 4 laps
     Davide Valsecchi    Epsilon Euskadi     + 4 laps
     Christian Montanari Prema               + 4 laps
     Hayanari Shimoda    Victory             + 4 laps
     Alvaro Barba        Jenzer             + 20 laps
     Carlos Iaconelli    EuroInternational  + 20 laps