Calado masters slippery Silverstone

The field began the race on slicks in dry conditions, but a series of downpours once the race got underway made the going extremely challenging for the drivers.

Both Calado and Vergne made poor getaways and Carlin team-mate Lucas Foresti led the field around the first lap until Vergne lunged past at Abbey to re-take the lead. The French Red Bull junior looked rapid in the dry, but less sure-footed as the rain came and intensified.

Calado came on strong as the conditions got worse and, having worked his way past team-mates Adriano Buzaid, Rupert Svendsen-Cook and Foresti after his poor start, managed to catch the championship leader.

The pair raced side-by-side for several laps before Vergne slid off onto the grass at the complex and fell to second.

Once ahead, Calado continued to pull away and claimed his fourth victory of the season to move into second place in the points.

Vergne took a distant second, well clear of battling Brazilian trio Foresti, Buzaid, and Felipe Nasr (Double R).

Svendsen-Cook rounded out the top six, ahead of Raikkonen Robertson's Carlos Huertas and Fortec pairing Daniel McKenzie and Oli Webb. Hitech's Will Buller revelled in the difficult conditions and made it into the top seven, but fell back through the top 10 in the latter stages and eventually retired his sick-sounding Dallara-Volkswagen on the penultimate lap.

Double R's Daisuke Nakajima thus took the final point for 10th place. The Japanese driver was the highest placed of a glut of drivers that switched to wets after the early downpour. The gamble didn't work for these drivers and they finished well adrift, but Nakajima was at least able to catch and pass Hitech's Gabriel Dias, who led the 'wet class' for much of the race.

Both of T-Sport's National Class runners switched to wets and Menasheh Idafar led the class in the late stages, but a misjudged pass on Mucke's Carlos Munoz at Abbey caused him to spin and stall, so Juan Carlos Sistos (West-Tec) claimed class victory on his series debut by staying out and pounding round for the entire race on slick tyres.

Pos  Driver                Team                 Car     Time/Gap
 1.  James Calado          Carlin               D/V   30m48.609s
 2.  Jean-Eric Vergne      Carlin               D/V     + 7.193s
 3.  Lucas Foresti         Carlin               D/V    + 21.568s
 4.  Adriano Buzaid        Carlin               D/V    + 22.750s
 5.  Felipe Nasr           Raikkonen Robertson  D/M    + 23.525s
 6.  Rupert Svendsen-Cook  Carlin               D/V    + 32.643s
 7.  Carlos Huertas        Raikkonen Robertson  D/M    + 33.675s
 8.  Daniel McKenzie       Fortec               D/M    + 34.528s
 9.  Oli Webb              Fortec               D/M    + 41.877s
10.  Daisuke Nakajima      Raikkonen Robertson  D/M  + 1m11.873s
11.  Gabriel Dias          Hitech               D/V  + 1m19.135s
12.  Jazeman Jaafar        Carlin               D/V  + 1m46.133s
13.  Maxim Snegirev        Fortec               D/M  + 1m48.823s
14.  Hywel Lloyd           CF/Manor             D/M  + 1m52.678s
15.  Carlos Munoz          Mucke                D/M  + 1m54.233s
16.  Alex Brundle          T-Sport              D/V  + 1m55.120s
17.  Juan Carlos Sistos    West-Tec             D/H      + 1 lap
18.  Jay Bridger           Litespeed            D/M      + 1 lap
19.  James Cole            T-Sport              D/H      + 1 lap
20.  Yann Cunha            Manor                D/M      + 1 lap
21.  Menasheh Idafar       T-Sport              D/H      + 1 lap

Retirements:

     William Buller        Hitech               D/V      15 laps
     Adderly Fong          Sino Vision          D/M       3 laps
     Pietro Fantin         Hitech               D/V       3 laps