Copyright GP2 Media Services
Starting the feature race in Monte Carlo from fourth place, Stoffel Vandoorne was able to take his third feature race victory of the season due to a good strategy with a well-timed pit stop ahead of Alexander Rossi and Sergio Canamasas.
After chaotic minutes at the starting grid, Raffaele Marciello took the lead from Rossi while Vandoorne tried but failed to overtake Arthur Pic ahead of him and had to settle for fourth.
When the pit lane window opened, Marciello and Pic pitted in lap nine to hand the lead to Rossi. The American soon found himself under pressure from Vandoorne, but the Racing Engineering man was able to keep the lead.
However, after a virtual safety car caused by a crash of Mitch Evans and Nick Yelloly the race leader decided to make his pit stop, and that was his undoing: Vandoorne was able to jump Rossi in the pits to take the race lead. Behind them, Sergey Sirotkin and Julian Leal came together in the pit lane which saw Sirotkin drop back down behind Pic and Sergio Canamasas.
While Vandoorne managed his tyres at the front and held off Rossi for the remainder of the race to finish with an advantage of six seconds, further back a battle developed between Pic and Canamasas. The Spanird managed to overtake his rival on the narrow street track, and was able to claim his second podium in the streets of the principality after Leal, who had finished the race in third place, was demoted to sixth place due to a ten second time penalty. Arthur Pic just missed out on a podiums do was classified in fourth place ahead of Sirotkin, who recovered after the incident with Leal to score his best GP2 result to date. Marciello will start the sprint race from pole position alongside Richie Stanaway.
