Donington victory for Carroll

The Northern Irishman blasted away from pole position and immediately opened a gap to pre-season title favourite Nelson Piquet Jr which the Brazilian was never able to close.

Carroll's victory was further helped by Piquet making an unforced error on lap 11, and spinning on the exit of the Goddards chicane. After that, Piquet's team ordered him not to push quite so hard, and he was far enough ahead of the chasing pack to rejoin and settle for second.

That left P1 Motorsport driver Carroll an easy run to the chequered flag, but he was careful not to lose concentration. "I don't like backing off," he said. "That just makes it more likely I'll make a mistake. I just kept my head down and ran my own race.

"I knew Nelsinho was there because I could just see a purple flash in my mirrors. I knew he was far behind and then, later, he was gone."

Third was an impressive result for Fortec Motorsport's James Rossiter on his F3 debut. He got past Carroll's team-mate Ernesto Viso at the start and then held off Portuguese driver Alvaro Parente, who was later spun out of contention by Viso at Redgate.

Venezuelan Viso also had a go at wresting third from Rossiter, but the Briton's defence was solid and, besides, Viso also had fifth-placed Carlin Motorsport driver Danilo Dirani to worry about in the closing stages of the race.

Those three remained close throughout the race, but finished in that order. Hitech's Andrew Thompson was closing on the trio at the end but ran out of time to make a concerted attack.

Thompson had already had an eventful race. His clash in the middle of the track with Dirani on lap five as the field went into Schwantz curve sent the pack spearing off in avoidance. The incident accounted for Alan Docking Racing driver Will Power and the sole Lola-Dome chassis of Danny Watts, who had a substantial off as a result.

T-Sport driver Ryan Lewis won the Scholarship class from pole position but had to fight hard for the victory. Australian Barton Mawer took the lead of the class at the start and Lewis had to claw his way back up to him before snatching the win at the very last corner.


Adam Carroll Dallara F304 Mugen-Honda 21m37.231s
Nelson Piquet Jr Dallara F304 Mugen-Honda 21m55.178s
James Rossiter Dallara F304 Opel-Speiss 22m02.477s
Danilo Dirani Dallara F304 Mugen-Honda 22m04.382s
Ernesto Viso Dallara F304 Mugen-Honda 22m04.578s
Andrew Thompson Dallara F304 Renault 22m04.859s