Baguette seals teams' title for Draco

The Belgian passed poleman Fairuz Fauzy during the mandatory pitstops to take his fifth Formula Renault 3.5 win of the season and secure the 2009 teams' championship for Draco Racing.

A relieved Fauzy pronounced second place as "job done," as the result ensured that the Malaysian accomplished his pre-race mission of leap-frogging Tech 1 Racing's Charles Pic for the runner-up spot in the championship.

Pic's hopes of maintaining his position were dealt a blow following a disappointing performance in Saturday's reverse grid race, and the Frenchman was unable to translate his 13th place starting position into a points finish.

Daniil Move completed the podium for P1 Motorsport. The Russian survived slight contact with third place starter Jon Lancaster on the opening lap, and was later embroiled in a tough battle with RC Motorsport's Esteban Guerrieri.

"When I saw Fauzy pit I thought he was taking a penalty for a jump-start,." said Baguette, "but I was told on the radio that it was just his normal pitstop, so I started to push.

"I am very happy this weekend as we have got everything but the pole. I want to dedicate this result to the team as they have been like a family to me. It will be difficult to think that next year I won't be with them, but I feel like I'm ready for Formula 1, and I hope to be there next year."

Baguette completed the opening lap in fourth place, having overtaken slow starting front row man Chris van der Drift, but losing out to the flying Move away from the line.

Lancaster's pursuit of leader Fauzy was short-lived, as the Comtec car slowed on the back-straight on the second lap. Move was the first to demote the Leeds racer, and later suggested that one of Lancaster's tyres may have deflated.

Now promoted into third, Baguette closed up on Move and overtook the black P1 car at the circuit's key passing location, the Turn 16 hairpin on lap four.

With Fauzy peeling off from the lead when the pit window opened on the following tour, Baguette was afforded some welcome clear air running and immediately set the race's fastest lap. The Draco crew waited another four laps before calling their team leader in for fresh rubber, and were joyous when Baguette exited the pits ahead of the Mofaz Racing man in 11th position on the road.

Toro Rosso Formula 1 driver Jaime Alguersuari's pitstop did not go quite as according to plan. The Spaniard, who has family ties to the neighbouring town of Alcaniz and the Aragon region, suffered a severe delay when he attempted to drive off with one of his Carlin mechanic's front right wheel-gun still attached.

As Baguette pulled out a comfortable 3.2s margin of victory, attention focused on the scrap between Move and Guerrieri for the final step on the podium. Guerrieri had executed a superb manoeuvre on Move into the tight, left-hand, Turn 15 during the pitstop phase, but lost ground by staying out until lap 13 before opting to change tyres.

Although the Argentine once more narrowed the deficit to Move during the closing stages, the position was effectively settled in Move's favour when Guerrieri ran wide at Turn 5, five laps from home.

Oliver Turvey finished fifth for Carlin Motorsport and in doing so moved ahead of James Walker into fourth in the standings.

Walker, like Pic, was on the back foot after a troubled Saturday reverse grid race, but progressed nine places on his grid position in a valiant drive. Baguette's team-mate Marco Barba completed the top-six.

Pos Driver                Car               Result/Gap
 1. Bertrand Baguette     Draco             46m28.831s
 2. Fairuz Fauzy          Fortec           +    3.224s
 3. Daniil Move           P1               +   14.478s
 4. Esteban Guerrieri     RC               +   20.971s
 5. Oliver Turvey         Carlin           +   22.478s
 6. Marco Barba           Draco            +   23.006s
 7. Federico Leo          Pons             +   24.301s
 8. Chris van der Drift   Epsilon Euskadi  +   24.681s
 9. James Walker          P1               +   29.526s
10. Sten Pentus           Fortec           +   31.862s
11. Charles Pic           Tech 1           +   40.308s
12. Jaime Alguersuari     Carlin           +   40.395s
13. Marcos Martinez       Pons             +   53.161s
14. Greg Mansell          Comtec           +   53.425s
15. Filip Salaquarda      Prema            +   56.497s
16. Brendon Hartley       Tech             + 1m02.432s
17. Mihai Marinescu       Interwetten      + 1m03.156s
18. Guillaume Moreau      SG               + 1m03.490s
19. Bruno Méndez          RC               + 1m14.899s
20. Jon Lancaster         Comtec           + 1m23.963s
21. Keisuke Kunimoto      Epsilon Euskadi  +    1 laps
22. Julian Leal           Prema            +    3 laps
23. Salvador Duran        Interwetten      +    5 laps

Retirements

    Anton Nebylitskiy     SG                    9 laps