Martinez wins again in WSR race two

Martinez's Pons team timed its mandatory pitstops to perfection, waiting until a mid-race rain shower had set in before stopping for a set of wet tyres.

"It started to rain after a while, but the team told me to wait and not to come in," said Martinez. "On one sector it was really wet. When I did eventually exit the pits with wets I was in effect first, as there were five cars ahead of me on the road, and they had yet to change tyres. It has been a dream start to the season."

Sten Pentus also benefited from good strategy, but drove superbly from 19th on the grid to finish second for Mofaz Fortec.

The Estonian even held the lead of the race on lap 21 after Martinez ran wide through the Turn 11 gravel. However, the more experienced Martinez recovered his position within half a lap, finding greater traction on the exit of the left-hand SEAT corner to power past the Fortec rookie.

Formula Master champion Chris van der Drift acknowledged his good fortune in holding on to the final place on the podium. After aquaplaning off the road, the Epsilon Euskadi driver had slipped back to seventh position when the race was red-flagged on the last scheduled lap.

A heavy accident for Frankie Provenzano exiting the final corner had left his Prema car in a dangerous position, and the organisers had little choice but to fly the red flags in place of the chequered flag. The final classification was given on countback to lap 22, and van der Drift was reinstated into third.

Before the rain turned the race on its head, pole-sitter Charles Pic and British Formula 3 champion Jaime Alguersuari had engaged in a thrilling duel for the lead.

Both men made relatively early pitstops for dry tyres, Pic dropping behind Alguersauri in the process, but pitting before the rain would scupper their chances of a strong result. Despite his two pitstops to Martinez's one, Pic recovered to sixth place while Alguersuari retired his Carlin machine with suspected fuel pressure failure.

P1's James Walker had started from the front row but was forced to retire after damaging his front right suspension on the back of team-mate Daniil Move's car on lap two, with Move then losing second to the charging Alguersauri and ultimately falling to 12th amid the weather and pitstop chaos.

Bertrand Baguette also held second for a while before parking his Draco machine, while his team-mate Marco Barba was an early victim of the conditions and brought out the safety car after a heavy accident.

It was under the full course yellow that van der Drift, Martinez and Pentus dived into the pits for the change to wet tyres that secured their podium finishes.

"I think the trick was to wait a lap after the rain started falling," said Pentus. "I just kept my eyes open and kept calm while other people made mistakes."

Racing resumed on lap 18 with Martinez leading Adrian Zaugg. The South African would drop back to fifth, but Martinez survived a number of scares, including cutting the last chicane, to add a second victory to his debut FR3.5 win achieved in race one yesterday.

Adrian Valles backed up his third place from race one to finish a strong fourth for Epsilon Euskadi. The Spaniard had chased Pentus over the finish line on the last lap, but lost out from the count-back from the race stoppage.

Pos  Driver                Team         Time
 1.  Marcos Martinez       Pons         41m20.462s
 2.  Sten Pentus           Fortec       +   1.819s
 3.  Chris van der Drift   Epsilon      +   2.908s
 4.  Adrian Valles         Epsilon      +   4.334s
 5.  Adrian Zaugg          Interwetten  +   6.314s
 6.  Charles Pic           Tech 1       +   7.214s
 7.  Fairuz Fauzy          Fortec       +   8.033s
 8.  Pasquale di Sabatino  RC           +  13.097s
 9.  Brendon Hartley       Tech 1       +  13.682s
10.  Greg Mansell          Ultimate     +  19.193s
11.  Oliver Turvey         Carlin       +  20.432s
12.  Daniel Move           P1           +  23.502s
13.  Mihai Marinescu       Interwetten  +  41.043s
14.  Miguel Molina         Ultimate     +1m24.670s
15.  Frankie Provenzano    Prema        +1m37.138s
16.  Jaime Alguersuari     Carlin       +    1 lap
17.  Anton Nebilitskiy     Comtec       +    1 lap
18.  Federico Leo          Pons         +    1 lap
19.  Omar Leal             Prema        +   3 laps

Not classified:

     Driver                Team         Laps
     Harald Schlegelmilch  Comtec       14
     Marco Barba           Draco        13
     Bertrand Baguette     Draco        12
     James Walker          P1           3