Rio Haryanto wins rain-hit GP3 thriller at the Nurburgring
Rio Haryanto survived the chaos caused by a late-race downpour to take his first GP3 win of the season at the Nurburgring
The Indonesian took the lead from Lewis Williamson (MW Arden) as the rain that had been hovering around the track for most of the race started to get much heavier, and everyone tried to hang on to their cars on slick tyres.
Haryanto and Williamson swapped places three times in half a lap, with Valtteri Bottas then passing the Scot as well and challenging Haryanto at Turns 10 and 11.
As they all tried desperately to stay on the track, Williamson re-passed Bottas at the final corner. He attacked Haryanto into Turn 1 on the final lap, but the Manor driver hung on and brought his car home to win.
To illustrate how bad the conditions were, Haryanto and several of the leaders then went off at Turn 5 after the chequered flag.
After briefly challenging for the win, Bottas had to make do with just holding off ART team-mate James Calado for third at the line. The two green cars were followed home by Adrian Quaife-Hobbs (Manor) and first-time points scorer Conor Daly (Carlin).
The points were completed by Tech 1's Aaro Vainio and Tamas Pal Kiss, while further down the order there was disappointment for two of the title contenders.
Polesitter Mitch Evans (MW Arden) led the early laps in the dry, but he was given a drive-through penalty for not having all of his wheels fitted three minutes before the start of the race.
Pre-race championship leader Alexander Sims was on course for a handful of points in sixth, but he pitted four laps from the end and gambled on a switch to wet tyres. It did not pay off, as the Status driver could only recover to 12th place.
Results - 15 laps:
Pos Driver Team Time/Gap
1. Rio Haryanto Manor 29m48.703s
2. Lewis Williamson MW Arden + 2.404s
3. Valtteri Bottas ART + 3.183s
4. James Calado ART + 3.611s
5. Adrian Quaife-Hobbs Manor + 4.948s
6. Conor Daly Carlin + 18.223s
7. Aaro Vainio Tech 1 + 19.692s
8. Tamas Pal Kiss Tech 1 + 21.387s
9. Simon Trummer MW Arden + 23.635s
10. Nigel Melker RSC Mucke + 32.818s
11. Ivan Lukashevich Status + 37.554s
12. Alexander Sims Status + 39.025s
13. Vittorio Ghirelli Jenzer + 44.359s
14. Matias Laine Manor + 47.159s
15. Nico Muller Jenzer + 51.928s
16. Nick Yelloly Atech CRS + 59.456s
17. Leonardo Cordeiro Carlin + 1m01.306s
18. Thomas Hylkema Tech 1 + 1m05.865s
19. Pedro Nunes ART + 1m09.296s
20. Mitch Evans MW Arden + 1m09.673s
21. Maxim Zimin Jenzer + 1m20.469s
22. Zoel Amberg Atech CRS + 1m22.044s
23. Tom Dillmann Addax + 1m22.921s
24. Dean Smith Addax + 1m39.214s
25. Luciano Bacheta RSC Mucke + 3m22.519s
26. Michael Christensen RSC Mucke + 1 lap
27. Gabby Chaves Addax + 1 lap
28. Antonio Felix da Costa Status + 1 lap
29. Callum MacLeod Carlin + 1 lap
Retirements:
Marlon Stockinger Atech CRS 11 laps
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