In a race decided by tyre management, it was Mitch Evans who had the upper hand and eventually crossed the finish line as the race winner. Stoffel Vandoorne finished on the podium again after yesterday’s Feature race win ahead of reverse grid pole sitter Alex Lynn.
As the lights went out, Alex Lynn made a quick getaway and remained in the lead, while behind him all hell broke loose: Nobuharu Matsushita had dashed up from seventh to second place, however, the Japanese pushed too hard and spun in the middle of the pack, turning the order of the field upside down. Only a few corners later, Oliver Rowland misjudged his braking and ran over the back of Rene Binder. The Brit went airborne and ended his race in the gravel trap after a short flight, and the Austrian managed to nurse his car back to the pit lane where he retired. Both drivers remained unharmed.
The safety car made an appearance while the track was cleaned, and the order in the field was the following after the hectic first lap: Lynn was leading the race from Vandoorne, who had sneaked up behind his team mate from P8, followed by Mitch Evans who had also profited from the chaos at the start. Nathanael Berthon had a lightning start as well, dashing up to P4 from well outside the points, and so did Arthur Pic who had lined up on the grid in P10. Nicholas Latifi was running in sixth place, ahead of Artem Markelov and Raffaele Marciello.
At the safety car restart, Lynn was able to make an unchallenged getaway, while Evans started to push and put pressure on the slower Vandoorne. A few laps later, Evans was able to make his move on the GP2 championship winner, and went to pursue the leading Lynn while Vandoorne came under pressure of Berthon and Pic. Evans was able to catch up to Lynn by the halfway mark of the race and, despite Lynn’s brave defending, claimed the lead soon afterwards.
The fight for the lead had allowed Vandoorne to close in, while Berthon was among the first ones to struggle with tyre degradation and came under pressure of Markelov and Pic. Lynn began to slow down soon afterwards as well, allowing Vandoorne to pass. Berthon dropped down the order, and towards the end of the race, many drivers even had to pit for new Pirellis, among them Arthur Pic who eventually dropped outside the top ten.
Evans managed his tyres well and crossed the finish line as the race winner ahead of Vandoorne. Lynn held on to his position and completed the podium. Sergey Sirotkin came home in fourth place after a charge through the field during the closing stage, overtaking Marciello in the final sector of the last lap. Jordan King finished in sixth place ahead of Pierre Gasly after a fight with his team mate Alexander Rossi. Markelov held on to eighth place and claimed the last point after his tyres had hit the cliff and were degrading rapidly in the last laps. Rossi finished just outside the points ahead of Norman Nato.
Stoffel Vandoorne and Alexander Rossi are still sitting in P1 and P2 in the championship with 316.5 and 169.5 points, respectively. Sergey Sirotkin has passed Rio Haryanto in the standings and sits now in third place with 139 points and a gap of only seven points to the Indonesian. Third place is still within reach for Mitch Evans as well: The Kiwi sits in fifth place with 120 points, and with only one round left at the Yas Marina circuit in Abu Dhabi next weekend, the battles are not over yet as everyone will be motivated to end the season on a high and finish as high up as possible.
