Maldonado takes his first win of 2010

Rapax driver Maldonado got past polesitter Davide Valescchi (iSport) at the start and never looked vaguely troubled, lapping up to a second quicker than his rivals before slowing down in the final stages of the races and settling for a victory margin of 17.9 seconds.

There was rather more competition for the remaining podium places. Valsecchi spent the first stint trying to hold off Sergio Perez, only for the Mexican to leapfrog him in the pits. But Perez's pace began to fade dramatically as the race progressed and Valsecchi captialised with a nice move at the end of lap 26 to reclaim second.

That was Valsecchi's afternoon sorted, but Perez now had ART's Sam Bird to worry about, and after a prolonged battled the Briton came out on top to steal the final podium spot, leaving Perez to just barely hold off Addax team-mate Giedo van der Garde for fourth.

By comparison, Maldonado's Rapax team-mate Luiz Razia had a relatively serene drive to sixth, but there was more action just behind him. DPR's Giacomo Ricci and Racing Engineering's Christian Vietoris were disputing the final point for eighth when they made contact and sailed off the track, allowing Ricci's stablemate Michael Herck past. Vietoris continued, but Ricci was forced to retire.

Not content with provisional pole for Sunday, Herck then dispensed with Racing Engineering's Dani Clos for seventh, and Clos later dropped behind Vietoris to inadvertently give the German pole positon for the sprint race.

iSport's third-place qualifier Oliver Turvey had a fraught afternoon, losing two spots off the start and then being dealt a drivethrough penalty for moving twice to defend his position. It was while honouring that penalty that he was then picked up for speeding in pitlane, resulting in another drive-through and an eventual finishing position of 15th.

Coloni lost both cars late in the race when Vladimir Arabadzhiev crashed into the tyrewall with two laps remaining and Alberto Valerio spun and stalled moments later, while Super Nova's Marcus Ericsson was forced to park at mid-distance when his engine exploded.

The other major incident occurred much earlier, when Spain feature race winner Charles Pic and ART's Jules Bianchi found themselves on the same patch of Turn 3 at the same time; the resultant collision putting both out of the race.

Pos  Driver               Team                   Time/Gap
 1.  Pastor Maldonado     Rapax                52m33.219s
 2.  Davide Valsecchi     iSport                + 19.531s
 3.  Sam Bird             ART                   + 23.327s
 4.  Sergio Perez         Barwa Addax           + 25.953s
 5.  Giedo van der Garde  Barwa Addax           + 26.129s
 6.  Luiz Razia           Rapax                 + 26.746s
 7.  Michael Herck        DPR                   + 30.444s
 8.  Christian Vietoris   Racing Engineering    + 36.719s
 9.  Dani Clos            Racing Engineering    + 41.469s
10.  Max Chilton          Ocean                 + 48.582s
11.  Jerome D'Ambrosio    DAMS                  + 49.848s
12.  Ho-Pin Tung          DAMS                  + 50.315s
13.  Johnny Cecotto       Trident               + 55.996s
14.  Fabio Leimer         Ocean               + 1m06.801s
15.  Oliver Turvey        iSport              + 1m08.392s
16.  Josef Kral           Super Nova          + 1m22.464s
17.  Rodolfo Gonzalez     Arden               + 1m23.789s
18.  Alberto Valerio      Coloni                 + 3 laps

Retirements:

     Vladimir Arabadjiev  Coloni              27 laps
     Adrian Zaugg         Trident             27 laps
     Giacomo Ricci        DPR                 25 laps
     Marcus Ericsson      Super Nova          11 laps
     Charles Pic          Arden               1 lap
     Jules Bianchi        ART                 1 lap