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13/05/2012

Conor Daly is the sprint race winner

In the sprint race at Catalunya it was Conor Daly who took the victory, after yet another driver lost the lead thanks to a penalty as a result of jumping the start.  When the race began Tio Ellinas, starting from 2nd passed pole-sitter Robert Visoiu and began building a lead, before the stewards found him to have jumped the start, giving him a drive-through penalty. This gave the lead to Daly, who had also had a good start, moving from 3rd to 2nd. Also penalised for a false start was Carmen Jordá.


An accident at turn 4 of lap 1 saw Dmitry Suranovich, Robert Cregan, Antonio Spavone and Tamás Pál Kiss retire, and yesterday's race winner Mitch Evans was forced to pit after suffering a puncture.  On lap 12 David Fumanelli was given a drive-through penalty for ignoring yellow flags, dropping him from 4th to 17th. Fabiano Machado's race cam to an end on lap 12 when the Brazilian spun into the gravel when attempting to pass Kotaro Sakurai.


Conor Daly slowly built his lead over Robert Visoiu over the course of the race and was over 3.2 seconds ahead of the Romanian driver when the race ended.  The victory is Daly's first ever in GP3 Series.  By finishing 2nd Robert Visoiu became the youngest driver to ever stand on the podium in GP3 Series. Matias Laine was 3rd, and the fastest lap was set by Kevin Ceccon.


Post-race there were penalties for António Félix da Costa and William Buller.  Félix da Costa was given a 1-second penalty for driving with another competitor and gaining an unfair advantage, dropping him from 6th to 7th.  Buller was penalised for causing a collision and will have a 5-place grid penalty applied for the feature race in Monaco.

Results of the Catalunya Sprint Race


1. Conor Daly 27:21.043
2. Robert Visoiu +3.265
3. Matias Laine +4.168
4. Aaro Vainio +4.877
5. Patric Niederhauser +5.669
6. Daniel Abt +9.341
7. António Félix da Costa1 +8.688
8. Alex Brundle +9.833
9. William Buller +12.090
10. Kevin Ceccon +12.401
11. Alice Powell +13.664
12. Kotaro Sakurai +16.703
13. John Wartique +21.703
14. Jakub Klasterka +25.550
15. Tio Ellinas +28.133
16. Vicky Piria +31.239
17. David Fumanelli +31.608
18. Ethan Ringel +37.862
19. Marlon Stöckinger +38.449
20. Mitch Evans +51.421
21. Carmen Jordá +1:16.560
R. Fabiano Machado Retired
R. Tamás Pál Kiss Retired
R. Robert Cregan Retired
R. Dmitry Suranovich Retired
R. Antonio Spavone Retired
1 António Félix da Costa handed a 1-second penalty for driving with another competitor and gaining an unfair advantage.

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