26/04/2009
NEWS STORY
Jerome d'Ambrosio has finished runner-up in the 2008/2009 GP2 Asia championship after finishing second behind Arden's Luiz Razia (right) in the final race in Bahrain
d'Ambrosio drove his heart out in today's sprint race at the Bahrain International circuit. Starting from sixth place, the Belgian made another brilliant start that put him fourth. He then posted the fastest lap time, overtook Yamamoto and finally, in the very last stages of the race, passed Rigon. With six more points, d'Ambrosio became Vice Champion, demonstrating once again DAMS' excellent form.
There was mayhem at the start however. While Luiz Razia got away perfectly, the championship was settled for Rodriguez and Valsecchi who were simultaneously taken out by Karun Chandhok and Pastor Maldonado. In the same incident, FMS' Gonzalez was also hit and with five cars stopped on the track the safety car was immediately deployed. At that point, the championship standings were unchanged with Rodriguez on 35 points, Valsecchi on 34
and d'Ambrosio on 33.
At the restart, Razia managed to keep his lead and was never caught by Rigon. Behind them, d'Ambrosio passed Yamamoto for third place and immediately posted the quickest lap time, pocketing the bonus point. The Belgian was now third in the drivers' standings as Rodriguez had scored a win in Shanghai. Therefore it wasn't enough, and Jerome knew it. He tried to intimidate Trident's Davide Rigon who resisted well under the pressure. Thinking about preserving his tyres, d'Ambrosio waited until the second to last lap to finally and successfully overtake the Italian, adding another podium-finish to his season and thereby scoring enough points to be declared Vice Champion.
Luiz Razia claimed a maiden win, while Davide Rigon bagged his first podium for Trident Racing. Behind the Top three, Sakon Yamamoto finished fourth ahead of the newly appointed Champion Kamui Kobayashi. Diego Nunes fought his way back to sixth place after a small mistake at the restart that saw him drop two places.
The DAMS duo takes the two top spots in the Drivers' Championship. Roldan Rodriguez completes the Top 3 ahead of Davide Valsecchi and Vitaly Petrov. Nico Hülkenberg finishes sixth and best rookie although he competed for only one third of the season.
In the Teams' classification, French team DAMS are champions ahead of Piquet GP and Barwa International Campos Team. Last season's winners, ART Grand Prix, finish fourth.