Van der Zande wins on British debut

The F3 Euro Series refugee dominated the race from the front after vaulting his Hitech-run Dallara-Mercedes past fellow front row man Max Chilton at the start.

Chilton (Carlin) put the Dutchman under constant pressure throughout the race, but once a first lap challenge into the Club chicane had failed, he could not get close enough to have another go and remained roughly half a second adrift for the remainder of the race.

"After the start it was already decided," said the victorious van der Zande. "It wasn't easy [for me] after only 29 laps of free practice, but I had a good qualifying and the car was very good. The team has done a great job with all the development."

Brazilian Adriano Buzaid put in T-Sport's strongest race performance of the season to take the final podium place in his Dallara-Volkswagen. The Formula Renault UK graduate stayed with the leading pair initially, but faded at mid-distance after a wild moment through Priory, which forced him to settle for a lonely third.

Fortec's Riki Christodoulou made a poor start, but once he and the fast starting Daniel Ricciardo (Carlin) had leapfrogged Daisuke Nakajima (Raikkonen Robertson) on the third lap, Christodoulou spent the race fighting a rearguard action to suppress the championship leader to fifth.

Nakajima dropped away to a comfortable sixth, while Walter Grubmuller (Hitech) resisted intense pressure from Nick Tandy to hold seventh. Tandy (JTR) produced a typically combative performance to surge through the field and salvage some points in his troublesome Mygale-Mercedes, after a disastrous qualifying session.

Brazilian Gabriel Dias continued his strong form this weekend by taking National Class honours in 13th place overall.

The T-Sport driver, who barrel-rolled out of race two at Oulton Park last month, used the championship class Fortec car of Victor Garcia as a barrier to nearest rival and points leader Daniel McKenzie (Fortec) to claim the class spoils by 1.5s.

Pos  Driver                Team       Car  Time
 1.  Renger van der Zande  Hitech     D/M  30m52.430s
 2.  Max Chilton           Carlin     D/V  +   0.453s
 3.  Adriano Buzaid        T-Sport    D/V  +   1.721s
 4.  Riki Christodoulou    Fortec     D/M  +   4.283s
 5.  Daniel Ricciardo      Carlin     D/V  +   4.809s
 6.  Daisuke Nakajima      Double R   D/M  +   6.299s
 7.  Walter Grubmuller     Hitech     D/M  +   8.493s
 8.  Nick Tandy            JTR        M/M  +   9.047s
 9.  Henry Arundel         Carlin     D/V  +  16.416s
10.  Carlos Huertas        Double R   D/M  +  16.849s
11.  Oliver Oakes          Carlin     D/V  +  23.146s
12.  Wayne Boyd            T-Sport    D/V  +  23.685s
13.  Gabriel Dias          T-Sport    D/H  +  33.156s
14.  Victor Garcia         Fortec     D/M  +  33.541s
15.  Daniel McKenzie       Fortec     D/M  +  35.647s
16.  Hywel Lloyd           CF         D/H  +  36.355s
17.  Stephane Richelmi     Barazi     D/M  +  40.827s
18.  Victor Correa         Litespeed  S/H  +  52.512s
19.  Max Snegirev          West-Tec   D/H  +1m20.724s