Grosjean takes Zandvoort victory

ASM teammate Kamui Kobayashi hounded the Frenchman to the flag, but remained trapped in the following dirty air and was 0.5 seconds in arrears throughout.

Having qualified on the front row, Mucke Motorsport's Sebastien Buemi failed to produce the anticipated pace, and was immediately muscled out of position by Kobayashi at the start.

Buemi swerved towards Kamui in defence, but the Japanese driver was carrying far more momentum away from the line.

As Kobayashi moved across Zandvoort's narrow confines to take the inside line for Tarzan, the first right-hander, a puff of tyre smoke erupted between the two cars as contact was made.

Kobayashi completed the move successfully, although he was later shown a warning flag by the stewards for his driving standards.

Buemi had a lonely race to third thereafter, spending much of the event with a five-second deficit to the lead pair, before easing off the throttle in the closing stages.

"My race was made difficult after Kobayashi hit me," said Buemi. "I had a big vibration and the steering wasn't perfect. Anyway, we didn't quite have the speed today, and we need to improve a lot for tomorrow."

Yann Clairay benefited from third place starter Yelmer Buurman's slow get-away to finish fourth.

Clairay's Signature squad were victors at Zandvoort in 2006 with Charlie Kimball, and in 2005 with Guillaume Moreau, but today their French pilot held up a bottle neck in the opening laps before finding some pace.

Clairay's initial lethargy, where he lapped 1.3 seconds off the leaders, led to intense pressure from Franck Mailleux and Nico Hulkenberg. Hulkenberg's closest opportunity in dispatching Mailleux for fifth position came as a consequence of a mistake from Clairay at Tarzan on lap eight.

With Mailleux covering the inside, Hulkenberg attempted a move on the high and wide line, but was rudely pushed onto the grass by Mailleux for his efforts.

On home soil Buurman finished seventh, fending off James Jakes by just three tenths on the line. Jakes and Buurman will make it an all Manor front row for tomorrow's reverse grid race.

In the last round at Mugello, first race victor Grosjean worked his way up to second in race two, and is hoping to repeat the feat tomorrow.

"We haven't decided if we will take off any rear wing to ease overtaking for tomorrow," said Romain. "The problem is that we need the down-force for the last corner in order that we can get close to people and in their slipstream down the pit straight. The wind is also a factor.

"Today it was strange and I wasn't pushing 100%, which helped Kamui close up. I didn't have to drive defensively, though, I just carried on with what I like doing."

Pos  Driver                 Car                   Time             
 1.  Romain Grosjean        Dallara/Mercedes      40:59.489
 2.  Kamui Kobayashi        Dallara/Mercedes      +  0.850
 3.  Sébastien Buemi        Dallara/Mercedes      +  8.831
 4.  Yann Clairay           Dallara/Mercedes      +  15.875
 5.  Franck Mailleux        Dallara/Mercedes      +  17.170
 6.  N.Hülkenberg           Dallara/Mercedes      +  17.626
 7.  Yelmer Buurman         Dallara/Mercedes      +  19.864
 8.  James Jakes            Dallara/Mercedes      +  20.170
 9.  R.van der Zande        Dallara/Mercedes      +  37.880
10.  Filip Salaquarda       Dallara/Mercedes      +  43.754
11.  Michael Patrizi        Dallara/Mercedes      +  59.568
12.  Cyndie Allemann        Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:01.120
13.  Sergei Afanasiev       Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:01.537
14.  Edoardo Mortara        Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:01.540
15.  Marco Holzer           Dallara/Opel          +  1:01.559
16.  Tim Sandtler           Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:04.388
17.  Euan Hankey            Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:04.987
18.  Tom Dillmann           Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:05.179
19.  Basil Shaaban          Dallara/Mercedes      +  1:15.359
20.  Jean-Karl Vernay       Dallara/Mercedes      +  7 Laps
21.  H.Schlegelmilch        Dallara/Mercedes      +  7 Laps

Not Classified:

     Driver                Car                 Lap   
     Daniel Clos            Dallara/Mercedes    1
     Edoardo Piscopo        Dallara/Mercedes    0