Sunday, June 22, 2008

Hanley grabs last-gasp Durango drive

Hanley grabs last-gasp Durango drive

Renault Development Driver Ben Hanley has been thrown a GP2 Series lifeline by Durango this weekend at Magny-Cours, after the Briton parted company with the Barwa Campos Team after three rounds.

Hanley, runner-up to Alvaro Parente in last year's Renault World Series, split with former Minardi driver Adrian Campos's team "by mutual decision" after Monaco.

He will replace Davide Valsecchi at Durango, who is yet to recover fully from the spinal compression he suffered in a 170mph accident during qualifying at Istanbul.

Hanley said: "I got the call [from Durango] on Wednesday evening at 8.30, so here I am. Whether I will complete the championship, I don't know, we're taking it on a race-by-race basis.

"I've had a bit of bad luck this year, with an engine failure at Barcelona, a 10-place grid penalty in Turkey and a bad Monaco weekend.

"Durango is a completely different atmosphere to Campos, so I'm just going to take each race as it comes and hopefully get some good results."

Fresh faces in new places this weekend also include Carlos Iaconelli at BCN, Andy Soucek at Super Nova, Michael Herck at DPR, Marco Asmer at FMS and Lucas di Grassi replacing Hanley at Campos.



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