Grapevine: De la Rosa wins Race of Stars

The two-race event provided plenty of action on the track, as the ten F1 and IRL drivers battled for victory in front of thousands of fans and under clear skies and soaring temperatures.

Race One was full of action from the first turn, as Helio Castroneves, who was third on the grid, clipped the back of pole-sitter Dan Wheldon, creating a chain reaction which caused a major pile-up.

IndyCar racer Roger Yasukawa was able to avoid contact and took the lead, but a fast recovering Montoya, who was also able to take evasive action in Turn One, overtook him on the second lap.

After that the man to watch was Squadra Toro Rosso's Tonio Liuzzi, who set a blistering pace in pursuit of the leader.

It was a matter of laps before the Italian was in Montoya's tail and twice he made contact with the Colombian under braking. However his attack finished when he clipped the tyre barrier at the exit of one of the chicanes, bending his rear axle and putting himself out of the race.

With Montoya leading de la Rosa by more than ten seconds, and Yasukawa third and far from the Spaniard as well his pursuers, the rest of the 20-minute race was a straight forward affair.

Montoya took his first win in Colombia for more than eight years and looked as the favorite to take the overall win, as only Liuzzi was able to set quicker laptimes during the race.

Conditions for Race One were tough, with ambient temperatures raising above 35 degrees Celsius and track temperatures exceeding 50. That made levels of grip poor, which - combined with the bumpy surface and the challenging layout - caused many incidents through the 16-lap race.

Race Two was no different, although there was one man in control from start to flag: Liuzzi showed his mates how it should be done, putting his Easykart at incredible angles under braking, while going quicker than everyone else and putting on a great show for the stands.

Liuzzi also took full benefit of his grid position, as the results from Race One were inverted to determine the starting order.

Only his Red Bull teammate Christian Klien was able to get close to the Italian's laptimes during the race, but after failing to finish Race One - like Liuzzi - the Austrian was not in contention for the overall win.

The fight for the top prize was running behind the leaders, with Castroneves in third and looking as the likely winner, as results from Race One and Race One were added to determine the final standings.

However, the two-time Indy 500 winner was denied the chance to go for his usual fence-climbing antics when he lost the left-rear wheel of his Easykart with only three laps to go.

That, added to the misfortunes of Midland's newly signed Christijan Albers and some of his colleagues, left Pedro de la Rosa third on the road and gave him enough points to take overall victory.

Teammate Montoya's race was full of drama after he bent a steering arm on his chassis when he tried to overtake Dan Wheldon.

The Colombian was still able to recover and was catching the Briton again in the last part of the race, but he eventually took sixth behind Wheldon and Antonio Pizzonia, who claimed fourth having started from pole.

Avoiding trouble on the track was Roger Yasukawa, who took full advantage of his third place on Race One to add enough points to secure himself a place on the podium beside the McLaren-Mercedes duo of de la Rosa and Montoya.

2005 Race of Stars - Final Standings:

Pos  Driver               Points
 1.  Pedro de la Rosa      17
 2.  Juan Pablo Montoya    15
 3.  Roger Yasukawa        12
 4.  Dan Wheldon           12
 5.  Christian Klien       12
 6.  Vitontonio Liuzzi     12
 7.  Helio Castroneves     10
 8.  Antonio Pizzonia       8
 9.  Christijan Albers      6
10.  Oliver Ronzheimer      5