Mustonen takes Rockingham victory

The Finn beat pole-sitter Max Chilton off the line and controlled a comfortable gap over second-placed Jaime Alguersuari for the majority of the 24-lap race. But a rain shower in the last 10 minutes coincided with Ericsson's charge from seventh on the grid.

Ericsson picked off Carlin teammates Oliver Turvey and Sam Abay in the early, dry conditions, and took third from Chilton as the Hitech driver aborted his defence of the position at the hairpin and went straight on round the oval.

The Swede then set about the lead pair, who were over three seconds up the road. The gap reduced more each lap the wetter the circuit got as the rain brought about a classic slicks on a wet track situation, and Ericsson was a second a lap quicker than Alguersuari and Mustonen as the track got more slippery.

Ericsson took second from Alguersuari down the inside at turn two and threatened Mustonen's lead as the Finn lost three seconds on one lap as he tried to lap Hywel Lloyd.

But Ericsson ran out of laps and Mustonen held on to record his first victory of the season.

"I pushed at the start to make myself a gap and then it was comfortable," said Mustonen. "It was very slippery for a couple of laps at the end and I lost a lot of time lapping a car, but I had it under control."

Ericsson added: "That was a brilliant race, I knew we had the pace to do that. When it was only raining a little I was really quick and thought maybe I could even win, but it rained harder and I found the limit a couple of times and thought I'd better calm down because second is a great result and exactly what we needed."

Alguersuari completed the podium in third, ahead of Chilton who disappeared round the oval twice during the race but dropped back to resume his correct position each time.

Championship leader Sergio Perez finished fifth after making solid progress throughout the race from 11th on the grid, ahead of Oliver Turvey who rounded out the top six.

Andy Meyrick took another National Class victory, returning to form after a couple of retirements at Monza. He slipped back through the field of Championship Class cars from his excellent fourth row grid spot.

At one point it looked as though he would be challenged by Salman Al-Khalifa, but he strode away confidently as the conditions became more difficult in the closing laps.

Classified:

Pos  Driver                Car                     Time
 1.  Atte Mustonen         Dallara/Mercedes        30:40.004
 2.  Marcus Ericsson       Dallara/Mercedes        + 2.907
 3.  J.Alguersuari         Dallara/Mercedes        + 6.077
 4.  Max Chilton           Dallara/Mercedes        + 10.877
 5.  Sergio Perez          Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 13.886
 6.  Oliver Turvey         Dallara/Mercedes        + 15.066
 7.  S.Hohenthal           Dallara/Mercedes        + 17.246
 8.  Sam Abay              Dallara/Mercedes        + 21.343
 9.  W.Grubmuller          Dallara/Mercedes        + 23.199
10.  Brendon Hartley       Dallara/Mercedes        + 24.432
11.  John Martin           Dallara/Mercedes        + 32.720
12.  Michael Devaney       Mygale/Mercedes         + 34.941
13.  Henry Arundel         Dallara/Mercedes        + 38.808
14.  Nick Tandy            Mygale/Mercedes         + 39.538
15.  Ricardo Teixeira      Mygale/Mercedes         + 46.064
16.  Andrew Meyrick        Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 49.678
17.  S.Al-Khalifa          Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 58.719
18.  Stefan Wilson         Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1'07.462
19.  Jay Bridger           Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1'07.791
20.  Philip Major          Dallara/Mercedes        + 1'17.299
21.  Viktor Jensen         Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1 Lap
22.  Hywel Lloyd           Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1 Lap
23.  Niall Quinn           Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1 Lap
24.  Craig Reiff           Dallara/Mugen-Honda     + 1 Lap

Not classified:

     Driver                Car                     Laps
     Steven Guerrero	   Dallara/Mugen-Honda	   21
     Kristjan Einar	   Dallara/Mugen-Honda	    1
     Ali Jackson	   Mygale/Mercedes	    0

Fastest lap: Alguersuari, 1:13.229 on lap 5