Spa GP2: Rossi leads King home for Racing Engineering one-two

Alexander Rossi led Jordan King in a Racing Engineering one-two and claimed his first win of the 2015 season in the GP2 sprint race at Spa

From third on the grid Rossi jumped ahead of Nathanael Berthon into La Source and quickly set about catching poleman King.

Rossi looked to have the lead down the Kemmel straight but King defended well, only to run wide coming out of Les Combes and gift the place to Rossi.

The American managed the gap for the majority of the race, although King did managed to bring it down to as low as 0.6 seconds towards the end.

Rossi was never under any serious pressure and crossed the line 1.5s clear of his team-mate to take his first GP2 win since Abu Dhabi 2013.

King was comfortably second, despite a few laps of intense pressure from McLaren protege Stoffel Vandoorne's ART car.

Vandoorne however was soon under pressure himself from Mitch Evans after locking up at the Bus Stop chicane on the restart from a virtual safety car caused by Arthur Pic beaching his Campos Racing car in the gravel at Stavelot.

Evans, who had a slow getaway on the restart, passed Vandoorne after a handful of attempts down the Kemmel straight in the closing stages to secure his first podium of the season.

His Russian Time team-mate Artem Markelov capped off a weekend that also featured his first podium finish with a strong race in fifth, passing Sergey Sirotkin in the closing stages.

Lazarus driver Berthon started on the front row but couldn't hold on to a podium place. He fell slowly fell down the order to seventh despite a great start.

Williams Formula 1 development driver Alex Lynn had an eventful race with Sergio Canamasas to finish eighth.

The pair battled hard for the majority of the distance before Lynn eventually found a way past.

Rio Haryanto rounded out the top 10 ahead of Julian Leal, who fell dramatically down the order after starting fifth on the grid as he struggled with a lack of DRS.

RESULTS - 18 LAPS:

Pos Driver Team Gap
1 Alexander Rossi Racing Engineering 38m26.855s
2 Jordan King Racing Engineering 1.507s
3 Mitch Evans RUSSIAN TIME 3.225s
4 Stoffel Vandoorne ART Grand Prix 4.462s
5 Artem Markelov RUSSIAN TIME 11.642s
6 Sergey Sirotkin Rapax 13.573s
7 Nathanael Berthon Daiko Team Lazarus 13.770s
8 Alex Lynn DAMS 14.383s
9 Sergio Canamasas Daiko Team Lazarus 15.147s
10 Rio Haryanto Campos Racing 18.340s
11 Julian Leal Carlin 18.954s
12 Raffaele Marciello Trident 20.281s
13 Richie Stanaway Status Grand Prix 25.418s
14 Andre Negrao Arden International 25.548s
15 Nobuharu Matsushita ART Grand Prix 25.864s
16 Robert Visoiu Rapax 27.269s
17 Nick Yelloly Hilmer Motorsport 27.986s
18 Gustav Malja Trident 29.040s
19 Marlon Stockinger Status Grand Prix 34.546s
20 Norman Nato Arden International 36.590s
21 Sean Gelael Carlin 46.816s
- Oliver Rowland MP Motorsport Retirement
- Arthur Pic Campos Racing Retirement
- Pierre Gasly DAMS Retirement
- Daniel de Jong MP Motorsport Withdrawn

CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS:

Pos Driver Points
1 Stoffel Vandoorne 233
2 Alexander Rossi 128
3 Rio Haryanto 109
4 Sergey Sirotkin 109
5 Alex Lynn 86
6 Pierre Gasly 61
7 Raffaele Marciello 58
8 Mitch Evans 57
9 Nobuharu Matsushita 48
10 Jordan King 42
11 Arthur Pic 39
12 Julian Leal 38
13 Artem Markelov 37
14 Nathanael Berthon 24
15 Sergio Canamasas 23
16 Richie Stanaway 22
17 Nick Yelloly 19
18 Robert Visoiu 18
19 Norman Nato 10
20 Oliver Rowland 3
21 Andre Negrao 3
22 Daniel de Jong 1
23 Gustav Malja 1
24 Rene Binder 0
25 Marlon Stockinger 0
26 Zoel Amberg 0
27 Johnny Cecotto Jr. 0
28 Nicholas Latifi 0
29 Jon Lancaster 0
30 Marco Sorensen 0
31 Sean Gelael 0
32 Simon Trummer 0

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