PREMA’s Antonio Giovinazzi passed team-mate Pierre Gasly on the last lap to became the first driver to complete a double victory in the GP2 Series since 2012 in a chaotic sprint race in Baku.
The race was punctuated by a series of crashes at safety car restarts, with only 14 of the 24 starters completing the race.
ART’s Sergey Sirotkin finished a distant third.
The last driver to win both the feature and sprint races in a GP2 weekend was Davide Valsecchi in Bahrain in 2012.
As the lights went out, pole sitter Daniel de Jong was immediately leapfrogged by the fast-starting ART of Nobuharu Matsushita. The Japanese driver established a 1s lead by the end of a frantic opening lap which, in contrast to the feature race, was completed without incident.
The biggest loser at the start was arguably front row starter Sean Gelael. The Indonesian bogged down heavily and lost three places, including one to Campos team-mate Mitch Evans.
While Matsushita began to stretch his advantage at the front, his own team-mate Sergey Sirotkin was the man on the move. The Russian, who claimed his first podium finish of the season by finishing second to Giovinazzi in Saturday’s Feature race, hustled his way past Gelael before proceeding to set the fastest lap of the race.
Ahead of Sirotkin, MP’s Oliver Rowland closed in on Evans and the pair ran side-by-side for two corners before the British driver eventually managed to find a way the Kiwi to secure 3rd. Sirotkin followed by the next lap.
Matsushita would lose and the regain the lead in absolutely bizarre circumstances on the tenth lap. Having seriously misjudged the peeling in of the safety car following Jordan King’s clumsy overtaking attempt on Jimmy Eriksson – the Swede retiring on the spot – Matsushita was passed by Rowland into turn one.
But Rowland, along with De Jong locked their brakes and ran wide, allowing Matsushita to regain the advantage on the exit. Sirotkin’s comeback was completed as he too pounced on Rowland to make it an ART one-two.
Carnage ensued afterwards as Trident’s Philo Paz Armand put his car into the barriers; cue another safety car.
Second safety car and a second wave of chaos: The Baku circuit’s long straight was making restarts problematic at best with the field bunching up dangerously as the green flags were shown.
Gustav Malja was caught out by Evans’ braking on the straight, with the Swedish driver losing his front wing. The result of this was that he could not avoid ramming Rowland and ended up in the barriers. Gelael’s race was also ended after contact.
The third restart was about as farcical as the previous two. Raffaele Marciello tried to make a move for the lead but missed his braking point and slammed into Matsushita; the leader now out of the race, Marciello plummet last.
All this allowed PREMA Racing’s Pierre Gasly to come from nowhere to lead the race. The Frenchman had a shocking first race and finished 18th after contact with championship leader Norman Nato. With the field self-combusting, Gasly now held a narrow lead from team-mate Giovinazzi.
Armed with the DRS and hungry for a first GP2 double since Davide Valsecchi in 2012, Giovinazzi was glued to the back of Gasly’s car. The closing stages provided the racing spectacle that the previous 18 laps promised to deliver.
With Giovinazzi’s DRS not working, Gasly was given at least a fighting chance to take his first series victory. Just half a second separated the two team-mates as they began the final lap of the race. Giovinazzi closed in with the slipstream and, pulling alongside forced Gasly into a crucial mistake.
Gasly’s wait for a victory continued but Giovinzzi completed a superb feature-sprint race double in dramatic fashion.
Sirotkin completed the podium in third while King recovered to finish fourth ahead of Artem Markelov and Sergio Canamasas.
