Sergey Sirotkin took his first GP2 victory of the season after a dominant sprint race performance in Hungary.
The Russian made a fantastic start to run second early on before overtaking polesitter Jordan King on the fifth lap.
King led home teammate Norman Nato for a Racing Engineering 2-3 with championship leader Pierre Gasly extending his series lead with seventh place and fastest lap.
A multi-car crash caused by a spinning Arthur Pic at Turn 2 took out Alex Lynn, Nobuharu Matsushita and Luca Ghiotto and brought out a first lap safety car. Having jumped four places to run second on a frenetic opening lap, however, Sirotkin wasted no time in pouncing on King and the Russian took the lead on the fifth lap.
Sirotkin immediately broke clear and built a steady 1.4s lead approaching half-distance. Racing Engineering teammates King and Norman Nato ran comfortably in second and third but it was once again Artem Markelov on the move.
The Russian, having started ninth, made full use of DRS to pass Mitch Evans under braking to take fourth at Turn 1 , but the RUSSIAN Time driver couldn’t make significant inroads into Nato in front.
Race one winner Pierre Gasly was lucky to avoid Pic on the opening lap and was happy to run seventh for the duration of the race.
The championship leader came into his own in the latter stages, setting the fastest lap as he closed in on MP’s Oliver Rowland but four extra points was enough to extend his points advantage as his closest challengers ran into difficulties.
Gasly’s teammate Antonio Giovinazzi was unable to continue his superb 2016 form after receiving a 10-second stop-go penalty following a clumsy move on Matsushita at Turn 1 on the opening lap. The Italian completed a lonely race with a damaged car to finish 17th and last at the end.
Raffaele Marciello also struggled after an encouraging feature race performance. The Italian couldn’t keep pace with Gasly in front and languished in eighth come the chequered flag.
The status quo remaining in the closing laps, Sirotkin continued serenely to victory, extending his lead over King to 2.4s. The ART driver was unchallenged once out front and backed up his Feature race podium in perfect style.
Arden’s Jimmy Eriksson’s weekend went from bad to worse; the Swedish driver, who lost sprint race pole in the dying stages on Saturday was embroiled in a feisty battle with Sergio Canamasas before mechanical woes hampered the former GP3 race winner’s day for the second race in a row.
Out front, Sirotkin was in a league of his own as his lead over King began to stabilise. Behind the leading two, Nato was coming under increasing pressure from Markelov for third.
No changes in the final laps as Sirotkin charged to his first win of the season, 4.9s ahead of King, wth Nato completing the podium. Markelov led home Evans, Rowland, Gasly and Raffaele Marciello.
