After  his  maiden  win  yesterday,  Romain  Grosjean  snatched  his  second  victory  in  an action-packed sprint race in Dubai. Starting eighth on the reversed grid, the ART driver made an excellent start and managed to come out in 5th place from the first corner.

While Karun Chandhok dropped from second to seventh due to a clutch problem, Adrian Valles also made a great start and briefly passed leader Fauzy in the first corner, but then suffered from mechanical problems and had to retire. The safety car came out on Lap 2 after Buemi and Puglisi touched and the Swiss had to stop. On Lap 4, Luca Filippi - then 2nd - was also forced to retire due to a gear box problem. Grosjean was hence  4th. 

He  had  a  wonderful  restart  and  passed  Chandhok  at  Turn  1.  He  then  overtook Yoshimoto  who  was  pushed  wide  by  backmarker  Schleghelmilch.  The  RDD  boy  rapidly  caught race leader Fauzy and passed him to finally cross the finish line as a winner for the second time in less than 24 hours. Karun Chandhok finished third. Starting from the last row, Vitaly Petrov made a strong performance at the wheel of his Campos car and finished 9th.

Bruno Senna was almost getting back into the points when he had to go back to the  pit  because  of  a  puncture  he  picked  up  while  fighting  with  Valsecchi.  The two Durango boys scored points today. It  is  the  first  time  that  a  rookie  grabs  victory  twice  in  the  opening  of  a  GP2  Championship.  Last rookie to win the two races in the same event was Lewis Hamilton in Silverstone, 2006. Romain  Grosjean  (ART  Grand  Prix):  “I  wasn’t  really  going  for  the  win,  but  I  was  hoping  for  a podium.  I  knew  I  had  the  pace  to  do  it.  At  the  restart,  I  was P4 and I passed Yoshimoto. That’s when I realize that I could go for the win.

I honestly didn’t think I could achieve such a good result here. However, it doesn’t mean anything: I’m still learning and I will now concentrate on Indonesia.” Fairuz Fauzy (Super Nova Racing): “I had a good start and got passed by Valles briefly. I led for most  of  the  race  until  I  was  struggling  with  oversteer.  I  saw  Romain  catching  up  quickly  and  he passed me.

I think that this is still a good result and I am now looking forward to Indonesia. ” Karun  Chandhok  (iSport  International):  “I  had  a  clutch  problem  at  the  start  and  that’s  how  I dropped from second to seventh. It’s a real shame and we have to analyse exactly what happened. We  had  a  real  good  pace  here  and  we  could  have  hoped  for  a  better  result.  In  Indonesia,  we should also be competitive and fight for the win.”