Oschersleben, race 2: Kaffer wins

Paffett made a perfect start from second on the grid to take the lead into the first corner and quickly built up a comfortable cushion. But Paffett wasn't the only one to make an impressive start and Kaffer came through from fourth on the grid to slot into second place ahead of poleman Toshihiro Kaneishi, who was bogged down with too much wheelspin.

After taking his debut win on Saturday, the former BRDC McLaren Autosport Award winner looked set to make it two in a row until he began to slow on lap six, before reluctantly pulling off into the pits.

"I had a pretty good start," said Paffett, "and the car felt better than yesterday because we had a better balanced set of tyres on it. Then going down the straight I heard a funny noise from the engine and suddenly lost power, so I just coasted around and came in.

"We need to look at the data, but everything looks fine at first glance. Points wise it has knocked us back a little bit, but anything can happen still."

Kaffer picked up the lead and managed to pull away from Kaneishi in second place and proceeded to continue untroubled until the chequered flag.

The battle for second place was less clear cut and Frank Diefenbacher applied constant pressure to Kaneishi and despite much weaving and several vein attempts the German just could not get by and had to settle for third.

Bernhard Auinger finished fourth in his Opel Team BSR Dallara ahead of Tony Schmidt, who managed to hold on to fifth place despite running wide early in the race.

Kaneishi's second place gives the consistent Japanese the championship lead by five points over race winner Kaffer, who moves into second place. The German was so pleased to take the win that he began punching the air well before the finish line. He then proceeded to complete several doughnuts in celebration and promptly stalled his Honda engine and rather embarrassingly had to be push-started by some marshals.


Pierre Kaffer, Team Kolles Dallara F301-Mugen, +14.5s
Toshihiro Kaneishi, BSR Dallara F301-Opel, +9.3s
Frank Diefenbacher, Team BSR Dallara F399-Opel, 21.1s
Bernhard Auinger, Team BSR Dallara F301-Opel, 25.4s
Tony Schmidt, GM Dallara F301-Toyota, 16.8s
Robert Lechner, Team KMS Dallara F301-Opel, +10.5s
Bjorn Wirdheim, Prema Powerteam Dallara F301-Opel, +14.9s
Giammaria Raffaele, Cram Competition Dallara F301-Opel, 20.3s
Stefan Mucke, ADDC Dallara F300-Opel, 25.6s
Kimmo Liimatainen, Team Kolles Racing Dallara F300-Mugen, 25.6s


Kaneishi 72
Kaffer 67
Diefenbacher 58
Mucke 52
Winkelhock 47
Gary Paffett 39