Hulkenberg wins chaotic sprint race

Starting from seventh on the grid, Hulkenberg made a good start to gain a few places off the line and then let various forms of attrition do the rest as those around him experimented with different ways to lose a race.

The ART driver now has a 20-point advantage over main rival Vitaly Petrov with three rounds remaining.

Sergio Perez followed up yesterday's podium with another excellent drive to second, the Mexican having to weather pressure from Petrov all the way to the line.

DAMS's Jerome D'Ambrosio drove a clean race to fourth and was pushed hard at the finish by iSport's Diego Nunes, who also enjoyed one of his strongest outings of the season so far. Karun Chandhok completed the points in sixth, denying Trident's Davide Rigon by just a few tenths.

Three appearances by the safety car within the first eight laps was a stark illustration of how messy things got elsewhere in the field.

The front row accounted for itself early on when Luca Filippi made a good start to jump polesitter Kamui Kobayashi off the line, only to make contact with the Japanese driver at Turn 2 and hit the wall.

Kobayashi continued, but his front wing was hanging askew and he was eventually flagged into the pits to have it tended to.

Lucas di Grassi, Giedo van der Garde, Andreas Zuber and Michael Herck were also first-lap casualties, while Ocean's Alvaro Parente was on target for a decent haul of points until he was hit by Edoardo Mortara, who was later issued with a drive-through penalty.

Franck Perera looked on track to score DPR's first point while running the middle portion of the race in sixth before slowing with a mechanical problem, and Durango's difficult weekend was completed when both of its cars were penalised for starting from the wrong grid position.

Pos  Driver             Team                        Time
 1.  Nico Hulkenberg    ART Grand Prix               44:36.084
 2.  Sergio Perez       Telmex Arden International   + 11.609
 3.  Vitaly Petrov      Barwa Addax Team             + 13.229
 4.  J.D'Ambrosio       DAMS                         + 28.580
 5.  Diego Nunes        iSport International         + 29.195
 6.  Karun Chandhok     Ocean Racing Technology      + 31.608
 7.  Davide Rigon       Trident Racing               + 32.101
 8.  Pastor Maldonado   ART Grand Prix               + 32.742
 9.  Javier Villa       Super Nova Racing            + 34.564
10.  Alberto Valerio    Piquet GP                    + 35.784
11.  Kamui Kobayashi    DAMS                         + 39.416
12.  Edoardo Mortara    Telmex Arden International   + 40.966
13.  Luiz Razia         Scuderia Coloni              + 45.114
14.  Ricardo Teixeira   Trident Racing               + 48.860
15.  N.Panciatici       Durango                      + 1'18.778
16.  Franck Perera      DPR                          + 2 Laps

Retirements:

    Driver                  Team                        Laps
    Daniel Clos             Racing Engineering           11
    Stefano Coletti         Durango                      10
    Álvaro Parente          Ocean Racing Technology      5
    Roldán Rodríguez        Piquet GP                    2
    Luca Filippi            Super Nova Racing            1
    Davide Valsecchi        Barwa Addax Team             0
    Michael Herck           DPR                          0
    G.van der Garde         iSport International         0
    Andreas Zuber           Scuderia Coloni              0
    Lucas Di Grassi         Racing Engineering           0