Vandoorne wins GP2 opener with late pass of Rossi

McLaren Formula 1 junior Stoffel Vandoorne claimed a last-gasp victory in the GP2 season opener after passing Alexander Rossi for the lead on the penultimate lap.

The ART driver started from pole position and held the lead at the start ahead of Alex Lynn (TOP). But an early safety car, triggered by a clash involving four cars, transformed the race.

Under the safety car, those who had started on the quicker, but less durable, soft-compound Pirellis dived for the pits while those on mediums, including leader Vandoorne, stayed out.

While the leading drivers pressed on to try and build a pit stop's advantage over as many cars as possible, with Rio Haryanto chasing Vandoorne, Rossi was the best-placed of those who had pitted ahead of Lynn and Mitch Evans.

Rossi made rapid progress to climb the order in traffic, meaning that he was certain to take the lead when Vandoorne finally stopped, but Lynn's challenge started to unravel when he tapped the back of the American's Racing Engineering entry while in traffic at Turn 1 and suffered front wing damage.

This left Rossi in the clear and he took the lead when Vandoorne finally stopped at the end of lap 22. But Vandoorne showed prodigious pace on fresh softs, lapping as much as four seconds quicker than Rossi and charging up the order.

He took second place from rookie Jordan King, who had made great progress after losing time during the safety car pit stops thanks to having to queue up behind teammate Rossi, with five laps remaining.

Vandoorne then carved into Rossi's lead, taking the lead in the DRS zone on the back straight on the penultimate lap and pulling away to win by five seconds.

Haryanto, who pitted shortly after Vandoorne, used fresh softs to great effect to charge through to second, passing Rossi on the run to the final corner. This left Rossi to lead home King for a Racing Engineering three-four finish.

Robert Visoiu, driving for Rapax, came through to fifth ahead of the second ART entry of Nobuharu Matsushita. However, the Japanese driver – who started second but plummeted into the midfield after a terrible getaway – was penalized five seconds for "driving erratically" and relegated to 10th at the checkered flag. This allowed Evans to take sixth ahead of Nathanael Berthon and Carlin's Julian Leal, the latter securing reversed grid pole position thanks to getting ahead of Andre Negrao, who was struggling on very old rubber, on the final lap.

RESULTS - 32 LAPS:

Originally on Autosport.com