ART Grand Prix’s Charles Leclerc has been crowned as the seventh GP3 champion after both himself and championship rival Alex Albon retired from the final feature race of the 2016 season in Abu Dhabi.
Albon led most of the first 11 laps of the race but was forced to fight off the threat from Arden International’s Jack Aitken, who moved from fourth on the grid to second on the road.
He had a lead of over 2s before the race was neutralised following a safety car period after Arden’s Tatiana Calderon after colliding with the rear of Jenzer Motorsport’s Alessio Lorandi at Turn 1 on Lap 7.
This gave Aitken the chance to compete with Albon for the lead throughout Laps 9 and 11, making two moves to steal the lead of the race. In the latter overtake, Albon tried to keep his position and ran straight over a kerb at Turn 10, bringing his car airborne and damaging his right rear suspension.
This gave the title to his teammate before he also retired from the race.
Meanwhile, Leclerc later battled with Santino Ferrucci in the battle for third place before locking up and retiring from the race at Turn 10 after appearing to damage his steering after slightly touching the right-hand side of the DAMS car. He later described the American’s behaviour as ‘stupid’.
The result leaves Leclerc (first in the championship on 202 points) with a 25-point lead over Albon (second, 177 points) with a maximum of 18 points remaining from the final sprint race.
At the end of an enthralling race, Nyck de Vries salvaged some pride for ART from the day by winning his second race of the season ahead of Arden duo Jake Dennis and Jack Aitken.
Ferrucci finished fourth but was given a ten-second time penalty for forcing Aitken off the track in a previous lap. This promoted his teammate Kevin Joerg up to fourth in the classification ahead of ART’s Nirei Fukuzumi and Campos Racing’s Steijn Schothorst.
DAMS’ Jake Hughes came from starting from the pit lane to a superb seventh place finish ahead of Campos’ Konstantin Tereschenko. The Russian driver was given a five-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage after battling with Trident’s Giuliano Alesi.
Ferrucci fell to ninth in the order with Campos’ Alex Palou completing the team’s best points total from one race in 2016 by rounding out the top ten.
Alesi finished 11th, with a Jenzer trio of Alessio Lorandi, Akash Nandy and Arjun Maini behind the Italian. Trident’s Sandy Stuvik and Antonio Fuoco were the final finishers.
There were seven retirements from the race. Leclerc was the final retirement of the race, while Koiranen GP’s Matevos Isaakyan stopped on track.
Albon followed Calderon and Koiranen’s Matt Parry as falling out of the race, while Trident’s Artur Janosz was the first retirement after spinning at Turn 2 following a collision with Alesi.
