New Zealand driver Richie Stanaway made an impressive return to GP3 racing at Barcelona today, claiming third and fourth placings.
Raced as a curtainraiser to the Spanish Grand Prix, Stanaway showed his class to claim a podium in the feature race.
And he almost completed a remarkable double with a strong showing in tonight’s sprint race, eventually having to settle for a tight fourth placing.
The 22-year-old got in four GP3 races for Lotus at the end of the 2001 season, getting on the podium once.
His return to action with the Status Grand Prix team had been highly anticipated and the young Kiwi didn’t disappoint in the season-opening meeting for this class, gaining rich acclaim from the race commentators.
The sprint race was held under difficult conditions, starting in light rain on a track that had been made extremely slippery by overnight showers.
Stanaway made a slow start off his sixth position on the grid but kept his cool as contenders spun out ahead of him.
His patience was rewarded as he worked his way up the field though he couldn’t get past Britain’s Dino Zamperilli despite a torrid duel over the dying stages of the race which was won by fellow Brit Dean Stoneman.
“It’s a solid way to start the season with a podium,” Stanaway said, adding he had been a little bit frustrated with his outright speed.
“But it’s a long season and we’ll take the points and move on.”
In the GP2 racing – the next division up – Mitch Evans paid the price for his aggression as he got involved in three car tangle at the start of the feature race today/yesterday.
Starting sixth, Evans got a great inside run off the line bit got squeezed at the first corner.
The cars of Evans and Jolyon Palmer and Stefano Colletti who had started the race second and third on the grid, suffered damage to their wings in the inevitable coming-together, but Evans came off worst.
He gamely held onto third place for a couple of laps until pitting to replace the nose of his Russian Time car. That early stop was before the opening of the compulsory tyre change window on lap six, so Evans had to stop a second time late in the race to change from hard to soft compound tyres.
Evans had the consolation of recording the fastest lap but it couldn’t help him get any better than a frustrating 16th placing in a race won by his former team mate Johnny Cecotto of Venezuela.
“Making two pit stops was never going to work. I took a couple of places back again but our strategy had been ruined at the start. If that first corner incident hadn’t happened I would have been in the lead and 20 seconds up the road,” lamented Evans.
Evans completed a forgettable weekend with a 20th in the 26-lap sprint race.
He made a brilliant start from deep in the grid, leaping from 14th to eighth over a furious opening lap. But tire wear eventually caught up with him six laps from home as he was swamped and drifted back through the field.
Brazilian Felipe Nasr gained his maiden GP2 victory.
