Guerrieri completes Brno double
Esteban Guerrieri completed a double victory at Brno to put himself in the thick of Formula Renault 3.5 Series' title fight
In a replay of Saturday's race, the Argentinean made a superior start to pole-sitting team-mate Filip Salaquarda, and from the inside of the front row powered into the lead at Turn 1.
Until worsening understeer set in during the closing laps, Guerrieri had appeared comfortable out in front. But the deteriorating handling allowed Draco's French rookie Nathanael Berthon to reel in the leader rapidly. From his second row starting position, Berthon's strong race pace had been sufficient to leapfrog him ahead of Salaquarda during the mandatory pitstop sequence.
With no signs of the illness that subdued his weekend at Monaco, Berthon applied heavy pressure on Guerrieri for six laps. Unable to stage a serious passing attempt, and suffering with inferior straightline speed, Berthon elected to drop back on the penultimate tour to finish 1.1s down at the chequered flag.
"The team amazes me all the time, because you have to remember it is only our fourth meeting," said Guerrieri. "We've scored the most points that you can in this game over the weekend.
"We have made a massive step forward, but we have to see what happens in the next races - if I am there, because we still have to find a budget. It is hard, but we will try and keep going. With the contenders going into this weekend not doing well, I am in the fight for the championship all of a sudden."
Having survived an attack from third starter Stefano Coletti into Turn 1, which resulted in the Monegasque spinning off on the dusty outside line, Salaquarda held off a tight squabble involving former British Formula 3 rivals Walter Grubmuller and Daniel Ricciardo for the final place on podium.
Brendon Hartley followed his Tech 1 racing team-mate Ricciardo home to complete the top-six. Ricciardo's result was not enough demote Mikhail Aleshin as the mid-season points' leader, and the Russian will claim the prize exhibition outing in Renault's roadshow Formula 1 car at Magny-Cours on June 19-10.
Sten Pentus appeared to be an innocent party when he was knocked into a spin on the opening lap at Turn 3. Keisuke Kunimoto, and Daniil Move also retired in the incident, while race one podium finisher Anton Nebylitskiy and European Formula 3 Open champion Bruno Mendez required attention in the pits.
Pos Driver Team Time/Gap 1. Esteban Guerrieri ISR 45m59.31s 2. Nathanael Berthon Draco +1.177 3. Filip Salaquarda ISR +5.681 4. Walter Grubmuller P1 +6.489 5. Daniel Ricciardo Tech 1 +7.206 6. Brendon Hartley Tech 1 +12.830 7. Jon Lancaster Fortec +13.881 8. Nelson Panciatici Junior Lotus +29.352 9. Mikhail Aleshin Carlin +29.641 10. Albert Costa Epsilon +30.354 11. Jan Charouz P1 +30.555 12. Stefano Coletti Comtec +30.925 13. Julien Leal Draco +31.539 14. Greg Mansell Comtec +32.293 15. Daniel Zampieri Pons +33.608 16. Jake Rosenzweig Carlin +35.822 17. Sergio Canamasas Interwetten +37.377 18. Federico Leo Pons +37.853 19. Bruno Mendez Interwetten +46.687 20. Victor Garcia KMP +54.733 Not classified Anton Nebylitskiy KMP 1 lap Daniil Move Junior Lotus 0 laps Sten Pentus Fortec 0 laps Keisuke Kunimoto Epsilon 0 laps
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