Fabio Leimer dominates opening race of Abu Dhabi GP2 event
Fabio Leimer claimed his maiden GP2 feature race victory with a dominant drive in Abu Dhabi
The Swiss driver, who switched from Rapax to Racing Engineering for this weekend, converted pole position into the lead at the start, establishing an advantage of almost two seconds by the end of the first lap.
From there, Leimer, who has two GP2 sprint race wins to his name, expertly controlled the gap to nearest rival Luiz Razia (AirAsia). Razia's only hope of attacking came around the mandatory stops, but Leimer was able to wait until two laps after the Brazilian had pitted before pulling in himself, maintaining his lead in the process.
He re-emerged second behind Addax's Jolyon Palmer and retook the lead when the British driver pitted.
After the pitstops, Leimer held the gap to Razia at around the five second mark, stretching his advantage to 6.9s in the final laps.
Palmer, who started fifth, held on to take third place, comfortably his best result in GP2, after holding off pressure from iSport's Marcus Ericsson in the closing stages. Palmer had climbed to third at the start after Rapax driver Dani Clos, who had to leave room for the fast-starting Razia on the inside of the corner, clipped Josef Kral (Aden), who was attempting to go around the outside of both, into a spin at Turn 1.
With Clos retiring after recovering to the pits and Kral out of contention, Coloni driver Kevin Ceccon finished a strong fifth ahead of best rookie Tom Dillmann (iSport). He narrowly held off the challenge of fellow GP2 newcomer Antonio Felix da Costa, driving for Ocean Racing Technology.
GP3 runner-up James Calado claimed the all-important eighth position, earning reversed grid pole for tomorrow's sprint race. The ART driver had to fight hard to earn it, climbing from 11th on the grid to pass Stefano Coletti (Coloni) for eighth with nine laps to go and keeping Nathanael Berthon (Racing Engineering) at arm's length in the closing stages.
Esteban Gutierrez (ART), favourite heading into the weekend, finished 21st after a lengthy pitstop to replace his rear wing, which sustained damage when he was hit by Coletti on the opening lap, while Max Chilton (Carlin) crashed out of seventh early on.
Results - 31 laps: Pos Driver Team Time/Gap 1. Fabio Leimer Racing Engineering 58m53.563s 2. Luiz Razia AirAsia + 6.911s 3. Jolyon Palmer Addax + 28.708s 4. Marcus Ericsson iSport + 29.812s 5. Kevin Ceccon Coloni + 36.619s 6. Tom Dillmann iSport + 41.518s 7. Antonio Felix da Costa Ocean + 42.496s 8. James Calado ART + 45.669s 9. Nathanael Berthon Racing Engineering + 51.345s 10. Stefano Coletti Coloni + 1m02.481s 11. Giacomo Ricci Super Nova + 1m08.632s 12. Rio Haryanto DAMS + 1m13.503s 13. Alexander Rossi AirAsia + 1m16.572s 14. Nicolas Marroc Ocean + 1m28.973s 15. Nigel Melker DAMS + 1m30.328s 16. Julian Leal Trident + 1m33.669s 17. Mihai Marinescu Rapax + 1m35.344s 18. Fabio Onidi Super Nova + 1m43.541s 19. Stephane Richelmi Trident + 1 lap 20. Josef Kral Arden + 1 lap 21. Esteban Gutierrez ART + 1 lap Retirements: Jake Rosenzweig Addax 23 laps Simon Trummer Arden 23 laps Jan Charouz Carlin 18 laps Max Chilton Carlin 2 laps Dani Clos Rapax 1 lap
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