D'Ambrosio bags pole at Sepang

Jerome D'Ambrosio took pole position for the first GP2 Asia race at a hot and muggy Sepang today.

It was two-by-two in morning practice when Kamui Kobayashi edged out DAMS team mate D'Ambrosio by 0.2s, while Roldan Rodriguez and Diego Nunes were third and fourth for Piquet GP.

But D'Ambrosio showed the better form of the two DAMS drivers in the afternoon, securing pole with a lap of 1m45.410s.

Incredibly, just 0.9s covered the top 22 drivers on what is a quite a long lap, while the top 10 was within 0.4s.

Nunes will share the front row with D'Ambrosio, while James Jakes had a good run to third for Super Nova, despite a spin. Kobayashi had to be content with fourth place, ahead of Javier Villa and Vitaly Petrov.

ART had a low key day with Pastor Maldonado eighth and Sakon Yamamoto only 15th. Returning to the series, Alvaro Parente took 10th for the local Meritus outfit. Bahrain sprint race winner Sergio Perez is only 18th.

Because of the changed schedule for the grand prix, the Saturday race starts at noon local time, before the first F1 practice session, rather than after qualifying as is usual.

Pos Driver Team Time Gap 1. Jerome D'Ambrosio DAMS 1:45.410 2. Diego Nunes Piquet 1:45.522 +0.112 3. James Jakes Super Nova 1:45.527 +0.117 4. Kamui Kobayashi DAMS 1:45.577 +0.167 5. Javier Villa Super Nova 1:45.649 +0.239 6. Vitaly Petrov Barwa Addax 1:45.720 +0.310 7. Davide Valsecchi Durango 1:45.748 +0.338 8. Pastor Maldonado ART 1:45.755 +0.345 9. Roldan Rodriguez Piquet 1:45.767 +0.357 10. Alvaro Parente Meritus 1:45.816 +0.406 11. Yelmer Buurman Ocean 1:45.954 +0.544 12. Davide Rigon Trident 1:45.978 +0.568 13. Luiz Razia Arden 1:45.989 +0.579 14. Rodolfo Gonzalez FMS 1:46.053 +0.643 15. Sakon Yamamoto ART 1:46.087 +0.677 16. Giedo van der Garde iSport 1:46.105 +0.695 17. Fabrizio Crestani Ocean 1:46.108 +0.698 18. Sergio Perez Barwa Addax 1:46.169 +0.759 19. Edoardo Mortara Arden 1:46.184 +0.774 20. Michael Herck DPR 1:46.259 +0.849 21. Hamad Al-Fardan iSport 1:46.265 +0.855 22. Marco Bonanomi Meritus 1:46.315 +0.905 23. Giacomo Ricci DPR 1:46.604 +1.194 24. Ricardo Teixeira Trident 1:47.838 +2.428 25. Kevin Nai Chia Chen FMS 1:49.642 +4.232 26. Michael Dalle Stelle Durango 1:49.857 +4.447

Sox revitalized, stay alive at home

Petrov wins wet Sepang GP2 sprint

Kobayashi snatches pole in Dubai