Dominant race 1 win for Danielsson

The Swede put in a commanding performance, leading every lap and achieving his goal of gaining a point for fastest lap.

Andy Soucek finished second after passing a slow starting Alvaro Parente into the Elf Turn 1 on the opening lap.

Parente held on to third, his first points finish in five races, but the Portuguese's slim championship hopes are now over.

Borja Garcia was cruelly denied of fourth place by a suspected transmission failure on the penultimate lap.

Garcia was the points leader entering the meeting after the reinstatement of his victory at Spa-Francorchamps. The retirement elevated Frenchman Franck Perera into fourth on his World Series debut with Interwetten.com.

"This is fantastic," said a thrilled Danielsson. "At the half way point in the season we had hardly any points; now it feels like we've pulled the plug.

"After destroying two cars in Spa, I thought the season was over. Maybe, looking back, that's helped by taking the pressure off."

At the end of the first lap, the order of the first six was: Danielsson leading from Soucek, Parente, Milos Pavlovic, Garcia and Perera.

Ben Hanley was delayed by a run through the gravel at Turn 1, but quickly set about working his way back up the order.

Danielsson edged away from Soucek who was unable to offer any response to the Comtec driver's searing pace. Soucek was 4.7 seconds behind at he flag, with Parente a further 1.3s adrift.

"There was nothing I could do about Alx," said Soucek "In the race his car was stronger, but I think I have chance against him in qualifying tomorrow."

Adrian Zaugg provided the race with some much needed overtaking, by out-breaking Carlin team-mate Michael Aleshin into Turn 1. Zaugg repeated the manoeuvre on lap four by squeezing passed Christian Montanari for eighth at the same spot.

"The first move was okay," said Zaugg, "but the move on Montanari was much more exciting as we touched a little!"

Pavlovic was unable to maintain his fourth place for very long, dropping down to tenth with a slow puncture. On lap six the Serbian's Draco car snapped sideways under braking for Elf and speared into the gravel.

Celso Miguez had the misfortune to be in Pavlovic's path. The Spaniard's Comtec car was clipped, launching Pavlovic into a spectacular series of rolls and forcing the innocent Miguez out on the spot.

While the front of the field static, tension was provided by Perera's spirited attack of Garcia for fourth. On lap 11 Perera briefly made it through into the tight left La Caixa turn, before Garcia made the position back on the exit.

Showing no ill effects from his qualifying accident, Pastor Maldonado worked his way up to eleventh from 28th on the grid.

The Venezuelan's efforts may have been in vain, though, as he retains only a mathematical chance of winning the championship tomorrow.

Maldonado's hopes now rest in the hands of the lawyers who are appealing his disqualification from victory in Misano.

With only tomorrow's feature race remaining Soucek takes the lead of the driver's championship on 101 points, two ahead of Danielsson with Garcia third on 97.

"There are about eight different scenarios about what could happen in the championship," said Danielsson.

"We have to wait to see what happens with Pastor's points from Italy and the appeal from the first race in Zolder.

"We'll probably be old and grey when we find out who the champion is, but at least I am now going into the last race in a much stronger position."

CLASSIFIED:

Pos  Driver            Team                     Time
 1.  Alx Danielsson    Comtec F3                28:38.881
 2.  Andy Soucek       Interwetten.com          +    4.742
 3.  Alvaro Parente    Victory Engineering SpA  +    6.033
 4.  Franck Perera     Interwetten.com          +    13.71
 5.  Sean McIntosh     KTR                      +   15.974
 6.  Adrian Zaugg      Carlin Motorsport        +   17.493
 7.  C.Montanari       Prema Powerteam          +   18.834
 8.  Michael Aleshin   Carlin Motorsport        +   26.254
 9.  James Rossiter    Pons Racing              +   26.851
10.  Miguel Molina     GD Racing                +   28.304
11.  Pastor Maldonado  Draco Multiracing USA    +   28.697
12.  Steven Kane       Epsilon Euskadi          +   37.117
13.  Bruce Jouanny     RC Motorsport            +   41.535
14.  Patrick Pilet     Tech 1 Racing            +   41.971
15.  Davide Valsecchi  Epsilon Euskadi          +   44.461
16.  Benjamin Hanley   Cram Competition         +   45.476
17.  Greg Franchi      Prema Powerteam          +   51.635
18.  Marco Barba       Jenzer Motorsport        +   58.648
19.  Alberto Valerio   EuroInternational        + 1:03.116
20.  Oliver Jarvis     Victory Engineering SpA  + 1:08.651
21.  Carlos Iaconelli  GD Racing                + 1:09.036
22.  Nil Montserrat    EuroInternational        + 1:15.096
23.  Borja Garcia      RC Motorsport            +   2 Laps
24.  P.Di Sabatino     Cram Competition         +   2 Laps

NOT CLASSIFIED:

     Driver            Team                    Laps
     Tristan Gommendy  Pons Racing              14
     Milos Pavlovic    Draco Multiracing USA     7
     Celso Miguez      Comtec F3                 7
     Robbie Kerr       KTR                       1
     Ryo Fukuda        Tech 1 Racing             1
     Alvaro Barba      Jenzer Motorsport         0

Fastest lap:  Alx Danielsson, 1:29.240 on lap 4