Vitaly Petrov blew almost every other driver away at the start of race one, on dry tyres in changeable conditions, to claim his first GP2 win ahead of teammate Giorgio Pantano, who just held on from Kazuki Nakajima to bring back a one-two finish for Campos Grand Prix at their home circuit.

The three drivers made the most of a chaotic race start with some brave racing ahead of some of their conservatively minded rivals who were on wet weather tyres, tearing away as the conditions improved to fill the podium despite a collision between Pantano and Nakajima as they crossed the line on the last lap.

With a downpour affecting the support race earlier in the afternoon and heavy, black clouds covering the circuit as the teams below were unsure which tyres to pick for the start: Timo Glock and Luca Filippi went conservative from second and third on the grid respectively, while Nakajima rolled the dice and started on slicks from pole. As the lights went out there was still a light shower falling, and turn one was always going to difficult considering the difference of compounds all through the field.

The Japanese driver pulled easily away from the grid in first after Glock and Filippi bogged down, holding back the rest of the pack: Nicolas Lapierre was also slow away from fourth and was immediately tagged by a fast charging Lucas di Grassi, with the Frenchman out on the spot as the Brazilian headed towards turn one. Faster still though were Roldan Rodriguez, who slipped through into the lead after finding a short cut at the back of the circuit, while Petrov and Pantano were blindingly fast from 8th and 10th respectively, along with Kohei Hirate who started between the teammates.

At the end of the first lap the rain had mostly stopped and the order was Rodriguez, Nakajima, Petrov, Hirate, Pantano, Glock and Filippi, with Marcos Martinez in an astonishing 8th position despite starting 19th, clearly gaining the benefit of local knowledge through the mayhem. Rodriguez was soon dropping backwards, letting his rivals through to undo the false advantage he found, but he was soon completely out of the running after being handed a drive through penalty for cutting his lap short.

Petrov was clearly on a mission, pushing with all his might to get by new race leader Nakajima, and when Pantano eased his way by Hirate to put himself on his teammate's tail the 3 drivers streaked away from the rest of the field, who now realised what a mistake they'd made by starting on wets, which was being forced home to them as Martinez sliced his way through the field to fifth.

Filippi and di Grassi were the first men into the pits to rectify their mistake, opening the floodgates for the rest of the field to follow their lead. The move did no favours for the Brazilian though, as he was soon stuck in the gravel and out of the race after pushing too hard to get back on terms with the field, and in particular title rival Glock, losing the back of his car and putting himself into retirement.

So fast was the pace of the first four drivers that they had caught up to Mikhail Aleshin, who had already stopped, on lap 6: unaware that anyone could already be lapping him the Russian did his countryman a huge favour by holding up Nakajima for most of the lap, allowing the Campos duo and Hirate to put themselves on his tail and running by the Japanese driver to set up the one-two finish, Petrov on the inside at turn one and Pantano at the next corner.