Huelkenberg wins again

Eurosport - Sun, 20 Sep 16:28:00 2009

Champion Nico Huelkenberg continued his winning run with victory in the GP2 Series feature race in Portimao.

2009 Monza ART Hulkenberg - 0

The German driver shadowed Vitaly Petrov before jumping to the front after his pit stop and cruised home for his fifth win of the season.

Luca Filippi and Lucas di Grassi completed the podium with Hulkenberg's ART Grand Prix sealing the teams title.

Pole sitter Petrov led the field down to turn one with Hülkenberg and di Grassi surging past slow starting front rower Dani Clos to slot in behind the Russian but Edoardo Mortara and Javier Villa came together at the first corner, prompting a safety car period.

When the race went live again the order at the front remained static with Hulkenberg pitting on lap 11 and re-emerging just in front of the flying Filippi.

Russian Petrov came in for his mandatory stop soon afterwards but could only re-emerge in fourth place, behind Hulkenberg, Filippi and di Grassi.

Hulkenberg went on to run home an easy victor, ten seconds ahead of Filippi, who had no tyres left after a storming effort and crossed the line with di Grassi right on his tail.

Petrov came home fourth, one second behind the fight in front of him but five ahead of Roldan Rodriguez, who stayed out of trouble to finish fifth just ahead of Michael Herck, who scored his first ever GP2 points.

Kamui Kobayashi sliced his way through the field from 18th on the grid to come home in seventh place after a storming race, just ahead of Davide Valsecchi in eighth.

Result:

1. Nico Hulkenberg ART 1hr 03mins 43.837secs 37 laps

2. Luca Filippi Super Nova +9.730s

3. Lucas di Grassi Racing Engineering +9.936s

4. Vitaly Petrov Addax +10.360s

5. Roldan Rodriguez Piquet GP +15.095s

6. Michael Herck DPR +15.418s

7. Kamui Kobayashi DAMS +24.097s

8. Davide Valsecchi Addax +29.337s

9. Andreas Zuber Coloni +32.301s

10. Davide Rigon Trident +33.812s

11. Dani Clos Racing Engineering +34.473s

12. Luiz Razia Coloni +35.096s

13. Pastor Maldonado ART +37.551s

14. Ricardo Teixiera Trident +38.143s

15. Diego Nunes iSport +38.478s

16. Javier Villa Super Nova +40.620s

Did Not Finish

17. Sergio Perez Arden 22 laps completed

18. Alvaro Parente Ocean 22 laps completed

19. Giedo van der Garde iSport 22 laps completed

20. Alberto Valerio Piquet GP 4 laps completed

21. Jérôme d'Ambrosio DAMS 4 laps completed

22. Karun Chandhok Ocean 1 lap completed

23. Edoardo Mortara Arden 0 laps completed

24. Johnny Cecotto Jr DPR 0 laps completed

Watch race two at 3pm on Sunday on British Eurosport 2 (Sky 411 / Virgin Media 525); Also available on your PC via the Eurosport Player - click on the link under the picture to subscribe

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