 Kovalainen is trying to prove he deserves to make the step up to F1 |
Finland's Heikki Kovalainen maintained his lead in the inaugural GP2 series after securing third place in Sunday's second race in Imola. The Renault test driver followed his opening race win by finishing behind Adam Carroll and Alexandre Premat.
Carroll, from Northern Ireland, tested for the BAR F1 team over the winter.
After a penalty forced him to pit and resulted in a fifth place on Saturday, he raced up from fourth and at the end of lap 11 took the lead from Premat.
All the cars are required to have Bridgestone tyres and Renault V8 engines that are 25% more powerful than the old F3000 engines. The three sons of former Formula One champions again failed to impress.
Nico Rosberg was lying second but eventually retired, Matthias Lauda also failed to finish and British Formula Three champion Nelson Piquet jr was sixth.
The 12-race GP2 series has replaced Formula 3000 as the last step on the motorsport ladder before F1.
MMIX
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