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Spielberg FR3.5: Marco Sorensen takes first win of 2013

Marco Sorensen took his first Formula Renault 3.5 win of the season in dominant style at Spielberg on Saturday

The Danish driver controlled the race from start to finish, and comfortably dealt with two restarts after safety car periods to take a four-second victory ahead of Nigel Melker.

Melker, who was unable to judge when Sorensen would restart on both occasions and fell back, made relatively easy work of pulling away from Kevin Magnussen, who retook the championship lead with a lonely third place after being passed by Melker on the opening lap.

Fourth-placed Will Stevens was the closest of Magnussen's title chasers, as Stoffel Vandoorne and Antonio Felix da Costa had a day to forget.

Vandoorne was lucky to start the race after his car developed a water leak before the start, but after getting barged down the order in the early laps he was eventually forced to retire.

Da Costa at least made it to the finish, but he struggled for pace throughout with an overheating engine and came home a distant seventh.

Things could have got even worse for the Red Bull junior in the closing laps, as Sorensen's Lotus (Charouz) team-mate Marlon Stockinger was closing on da Costa towards the end of the race.

However, Stockinger's progress was halted when the lapped car of Christopher Zanella inexplicably lunged down the inside of him into Turn 1, and then aggressively blocked him on the run to Turn 2.

Zanella received a 10-second penalty for exceeding track limits after the incident, but that did little to help Stockinger close back up to da Costa.

Results - 33 laps:

Pos Driver                  Team               Time/Gap
 1. Marco Sorensen          Lotus             46m36.415s
 2. Nigel Melker            Tech 1              +4.420s
 3. Kevin Magnussen         DAMS                +9.065s
 4. Will Stevens            P1/Strakka          +14.629s
 5. Arthur Pic              AV                  +17.511s
 6. Will Buller             Zeta Corse          +20.107s
 7. Antonio Felix da Costa  Arden Caterham      +21.411s
 8. Marlon Stockinger       Lotus               +25.752s
 9. Andre Negrao            Draco               +27.269s
10. Jazeman Jaafar          Carlin              +28.190s
11. Zoel Amberg             Pons                +34.231s
12. Lucas Foresti           Comtec              +39.229s
13. Nico Muller             Draco               +42.355s
14. Daniil Move             Comtec              +56.612s
15. Yann Cunha              AV                  +1m01.802s
16. Christopher Zanella     ISR                 +1 lap

Retirements:

    Matias Laine            P1/Strakka          15 laps
    Sergey Sirotkin         ISR                 11 laps
    Norman Nato             DAMS                11 laps
    Carlos Huertas          Carlin              11 laps
    Stoffel Vandoorne       Fortec              11 laps
    Riccardo Agostini       Zeta Corse          8  laps
    Pietro Fantin           Arden Caterham      0  laps
    Mikhail Aleshin         Tech 1              0  laps
    Nikolay Martsenko       Pons                0  laps

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