Felipe Nasr takes lights to flag Paul Ricard British Formula 3 race one win

The championship leader jumped Carlin team-mate Kevin Magnussen at the start and then held off a spirited early challenge from Hitech's Antonio Felix da Costa, before edging away to win by 1.2 seconds after 14 laps of racing around the former French Grand Prix venue.

Magnussen slipped to seventh after his poor getaway from pole, but fought back valiantly to finish in the slipstream of his third-placed Carlin team-mate Carlos Huertas.

A fantastic start by Fortec's Lucas Foresti left him holding fourth early on, but he lost out badly when slight contact with the recovering Magnussen on lap five sent him wide at the long Beausset right-hander.

As Foresti found his way back onto the track, Carlin rookie Jack Harvey slipped past team-mate Rupert Svendsen-Cook to reclaim fifth. Harvey eventually finished comfortably clear of his fellow ex-Formula BMW racer as these two completed the top six.

Foresti also lost out to Fortec team-mate Will Buller, who set off in pursuit of Svendsen-Cook. Buller eventually missed out on a place in the top six by just 0.6s, while Foresti became embroiled in a frantic fight with Jazeman Jaafar (Carlin), Hitech's Pietro Fantin, T-Sport's Menasheh Idafar and Harry Tincknell (Fortec) for the final points paying positions.

After plenty of place swapping, and the odd touch of contact, Jaafar won out to take eighth, with Foresti pipping Fortec team-mate Tincknell to ninth by just a tenth of a second.

Idafar and Fantin both enjoyed spells inside the top 10, but Idafar retired to the pits after slowing dramatically at two thirds distance, while Fantin dropped out of the fight with a sick-sounding VW engine on the final lap, eventually crossing the line 15th.