Vergne wins all-Carlin Spa battle

The Frenchman led home the second Carlin one-two of the weekend, but unlike Saturday's opening race, Vergne and team-mate Robert Wickens raced wheel-to-wheel. Indeed, there were several anxious faces on the Carlin pitwall when Vergne executed a committed pass for the lead on Wickens at Les Combes on lap 17.

Starting from third, Wickens had passed front row man Daniel Zampieri into the La Source hairpin away from the line, before harrying poleman Vergne over the early laps.

Unable to find an opening, Wickens opted to make an early mandatory tyre change on lap six and swiftly made his fresh rears tyres count. Vergne emerged from his own, 6.4-second, stop a lap later in time to see the Marussia-liveried car flash past on the exit of La Source.

"I thought, 'Oh no, it's going to be like yesterday. Another boring race behind Robert where I can't overtake,'" said Vergne. "Then I started to push and thought I had a chance."

Vergne claimed the lead around the outside at Les Combes, leaving Wickens to lock up both front wheels to ensure contact was avoided. Despite bad vibrations from his flat-spotted tyres, Wickens held off an inspired Chris van der Drift to take second by 0.7s.

Van der Drift's progress was aided by a 4.9s pitstop from his Mofaz crew, but the Kiwi still produced a commendable effort considering the last minute nature of his deal had forced him to miss the pre-season tests.

Zampieri led briefly in the pitstop phase, but the BVM Target racer arguably stayed out for too long before pitting. The Italian effectively dropped from third to sixth, and was forced to produce some on-track overtaking to recover lost ground. On lap 19, Zampieri took fifth from P1 Motorsport's Walter Grubmuller at Les Combes, and wrestled fourth from Albert Costa at the same spot on the last lap.

Indy Lights champion Jean-Karl Vernay had a commendable drive from 25th to 15th in difficult circumstances. Making his maiden appearance in the series with Pons, the Frenchman was neither familiar with Spa before, nor had he raced a single-seater with carbon brakes before. Team-mate Oliver Webb raced with an injured hand, a legacy of a collision with Sten Pentus in race one.

Draco's Stephane Richelmi retired following an accident with Charouz-Gravity's Jan Charouz on the run down to La Source. The latter was able to continue.

Brazilian Cesar Ramos was affected with similar symptoms to the bug that ruled out his compatriot Andre Negrao from taking part in race one. Fortec's Ramos was knocked into a spin at La Source on lap one and later retired after contact with BVM Target's Sergio Canamasas.

Results - 25 laps:

Pos  Driver               Team               Time/Gap
 1.  Jean-Eric Vergne     Carlin           46m56.662s
 2.  Robert Wickens       Carlin             + 1.468s
 3.  Chris van der Drift  Mofaz              + 2.173s
 4.  Daniel Zampieri      BVM Target         + 7.153s
 5.  Albert Costa         EPIC               + 8.434s
 6.  Walter Grubmuller    P1                 + 8.784s
 7.  Alexander Rossi      Fortec             + 9.183s
 8.  Brendon Hartley      Gravity-Charouz    + 9.419s
 9.  Daniel Ricciardo     ISR               + 11.808s
10.  Nelson Panciatici    KMP               + 12.602s
11.  Andre Negrao         Draco             + 17.960s
12.  Arthur Pic           Tech 1            + 26.870s
13.  Daniil Move          P1                + 30.199s
14.  Sten Pentus          EPIC              + 31.071s
15.  Jean-Karl Vernay     Pons              + 38.251s
16.  Nathanael Berthon    ISR               + 42.377s
17.  Daniel McKenzie      Comtec            + 42.730s
18.  Oliver Webb          Pons              + 46.859s
19.  Anton Nebylitskiy    KMP               + 48.245s
20.  Jan Charouz          Gravity-Charouz   + 56.088s

Retirements:

     Stephane Richelmi    Draco               17 laps
     Sergio Canamasas     BVM Target          14 laps
     Cesar Ramos          Fortec              14 laps
     Jake Rosenzweig      Mofaz               10 laps
     Daniel de Jong       Comtec               9 laps
     Kevin Korjus         Tech 1               0 laps