Watt takes second Spa win

Watt won this race in 1997, and led from the start as his fellow front row starter Fabrice Walfisch stalled on the grid.

The opening laps of the race were extremely destructive. Soheil Ayari and Bruno Junqueira collided while battling for third, Stephane Sarrazin span into the pit wall and Rodriguez pushed Franck Montagny into the barriers.

The worst incident came on lap five, when Justin Wilson tried to pass Alex Yoong into Eau Rouge. The two cars touched and Yoong hit the tyre wall side-on at high speed.

There was a long safety car interruption while the young Malaysian was extricated from his car and put on a stretcher. He was transferred by ambulance to the circuit medical centre, then taken by helicopter to a nearby hospital.

No information has yet been released about his condition.

The sight of an ambulance on the circuit seemed to calm the drivers down, and the rest of the race passed virtually incident free.

Rodriguez had lost places with a spin after his brush with Montagny, but was soon on the move, passing Ricardo Mauricio, Nick Heidfeld and Nicolas Minassian to run 2nd.

He tried incredibly hard to pass Watt, but dropped back in the final few laps after a sideways moment at Stavelot.

Watt took the win by just under 3s, and actually started waving to the crowd in celebration halfway around the final lap.

Minassian and Heidfeld had low-key runs to third and fourth, with David Saelens fighting through the order to take fifth from Mauricio, who was under heavy pressure from Andre Couto in the final stages.

Kevin McGarrity retired early, while Oliver Gavin, Dino Morelli and Jamie Davies were all part of a spectacular battle at the foot of the top ten, but failed to trouble the scorers.

Result from Spa: