GP2 Belgium

The race weekend in Belgium was surprising and made the end of the season very exciting for the end of the season. Some weeks ago it might have looked like Stefano Coletti's and Felipe Nasr's fight, but now there are 5 drivers who have a chance to win the championship. Let's find out what happened in Belgium.

Qualifying:

Russian Time's Sam Bird was the driver to gain pole position for the feature race. It was Bird's first pole position of the season and he was 0,2 seconds faster than Fabio Leimer who managed to get 2nd place on the grid. James Calado was 3rd and Ericsson 4th, while the championship leaders had a bit more difficult qualifying. Felipe Nasr was 10th but moved up to 9th on the grid as Sergio Canamasas had a grid penalty waiting for him from the sprint race in Hungary. It didn't look sunny at all for Stefano Coletti as his time was only enough for 20th place, which meant the Monegasque was going to face another difficult and challenging race.

Feature Race:

The track was a bit damp at the race start as rain fell during the Formula 1 qualifying session right before the GP2 feature race. James Calado had a great start from 3rd on the grid as he managed to get up to 2nd place right after the start and was already challenging Bird's first place coming down to La Source, but Bird managed to keep the lead. Leimer was 3rd, Rossi 4th, Ericsson 5th, Palmer 6th and Nasr 7th after the start but Palmer managed to pass Ericsson for 5th at Les Combes. After two laps Nasr did the same as his team mate and got past Ericsson by completing a surprising and fast move coming down into the first corner. Ericsson managed to stay right behind Nasr though and the pair of them ran up Eau Rouge and the Kemmel straight head to head, but Nasr managed to keep his 5th position.

On the third lap yellow flags were out as Daniel De Jong had crashed at the top of Eau Rouge. The car was in dangerous position and there was quite a lot of debris on track which meant the Safety Car was called out. The accident happened as De Jong was fighting for position with Rio Hariyanto and De Jong hit his right rear tyre on Hariyanto's front wing. This caused a puncture for De Jong and he went off the track at Eau Rouge with nowhere to go.

De Jong's car was cleaned away quickly and when Safety Car came in, the drama continued on track. Felipe Nasr was trying to pass his team mate Jolyon Palmer at La Source in a similar way as he did with Ericsson earlier, but this time it was a little bit too risky and it ended up with contact between the Carlin team mates. Palmer was able to continue his race, but it was race over for the Brazilian. Nasr's car was moved away quickly and there was no need for the Safety Car this time. The collision between Nasr and Palmer was under investigation by the stewards and Nasr was handed a grid penalty of 5 positions for the sprint race, which meant he was going to start from last position on the grid.

Sam Bird started to pull away in the lead and Calado was starting to struggle with his option tyres. Leimer was able to overtake the struggling Brit for second place and soon Calado came into the pits for the much needed tyre change. The pit stop didn't go as planned though and Calado lost a lot of time as there were problems with the front right tyre. Meanwhile on track Ericsson managed to overtake Rossi and it meant the top 4 was now Bird, Leimer, Ericsson and Rossi, meanwhile Coletti was already up to 6th after starting from 20th.

Leimer was the next of the top drivers to come in for his pitstop and he changed to a new set of primes. Ericsson did the same one lap later and even though there was a little bit of delay with Ericsson's front left tyre, the Swede still managed to get back onto the track in front of Leimer. Rossi made his own stop a couple of laps later and he initially took the advantage from both Ericsson and Leimer but Ericsson quickly managed to get his position back as he passed Rossi on the Kemmel straight.

The championship leader Stefano Coletti came into the pits after making his way up through the field after starting from 20th. It didn't go as planned for Coletti though as there were problems with the rear right tyre's wheel nut and it cost him time. When Coletti came back onto the track he had to battle with Dani Clos and James Calado. Calado passed Coletti easily and after that Clos was challenging Coletti coming up to Eau Rouge and broke his front wing by touching Coletti's car. Coletti's car also left some debris behind on the Kemmel straight and he started to lose some pace as a result.

There were no problems for the race leader Bird however and he made a late stop compared to the other top drivers as he came in for the tyre change with 11 laps left. Later he received a nice radio message saying: “Save tyres and bring it home”, and he did, it was a race without a single problem for Sam Bird and he won the race in front of Ericsson, Rossi and Leimer. Bird's team mate Tom Dillmann finished 5th, Julian Leal 6th, Stéphane Richelmi 7th and James Calado 8th after big difficulties with his pitstop, but his 8th place meant he was going to start the sprint race from pole position. Championship leader Coletti finished out of points in 13th place.

Sprint Race:

James Calado was starting the Sprint Race on pole position having Stéphane Richelmi next to him in second place as the top 8 on the grid were reversed from Saturday's Feature Race. Leal was starting 3rd, Dillmann 4th, Leimer 5th, Rossi 6th, Ericsson 7th and Saturday's race winner Bird 8th. Championship leaders Stefano Coletti and Felipe Nasr started the race from 13th and 26th.

Calado was able to keep his lead after the start. Leal pulled himself up to 2nd and Richelmi was 3rd. Robin Frijns who came back to the series for the Belgian race weekend started from 9th and was already 5th after the start and managed to overtake Fabio Leimer too, putting himself up to 4th place. It was a perfect start of the race for Coletti too as he started from 13th but was already in 5th place after the first lap. Felipe Nasr was also making his way up very well as he was already 15th after 4 laps even though he started from the back of the field.

Dani Clos continued touching the rears of other drivers as he did in the first race: first he touched with Jolyon Palmer at La Source and some debris was left behind. A brave marshal went to pick up the debris. Later on Clos was fighting with Johnny Cecotto coming into the last corner, and Clos broke a part of his front wing by touching the rear of Cecotto's car. There was debris left on the last corner too and the yellow flag was out.

Coletti lost a lot of pace on lap 9 and started to get pressure behind from Leimer and soon he was able to get the position. It didn't take long before Dillmann managed to close the gap to Coletti too and get past. The championship leader was clearly struggling again and he was much slower than all the drivers behind him. Coletti lost 3 positions in the last corner as Evans, Clos and Palmer were all able to pass him. The Monegasque dropped like a stone through the field and soon Cecotto, Bird, Trummer, Nasr and Canamasas passed him too. That's way too many positions lost in two laps and Coletti came into the pits to change his tyres. Meanwhile Nasr made a nice move on Trummer at La Source and it seemed like the Brazilian was going to try to fight himself up into points. He was very close to his goal as he managed to pass Bird who locked up his brakes on the last corner and went wide. After that Nasr passed Evans and was already up into 9th place. The last man he needed to catch to get into the points was Dillmann and there were still 3 laps to go.

At the front of the field Calado was still leading but Leal was closing the gap to the leading Brit. Adrian Quaife-Hobbs also wasn't far away from Leal in 3rd place. It started to look like Calado was going to get a lot of pressure in the final laps. Even though it looked very difficult for the ART driver, he managed to take his first victory of the season after all the struggles of the first part of the season. Leal finished 2nd and it was also his first podium finish on the season. Quaife-Hobbs was 3rd, Richelmi 4th, Leimer 5th, Palmer 6th and Cecotto 7th. Tom Dillmann finished 8th but on the last lap he was fighting for a position with Felipe Nasr and Dillmann cut the last corner and gained advantage from it. The situation was investigated by the stewards and Dillmann received a penalty which dropped him behind Nasr in the official results. This meant Nasr managed to get an important point after starting from last position on the grid.

Stefano Coletti and Felipe Nasr continue as the top 2 in the championship standings, but the pair need be careful in the coming races as they now have serious challengers. Fabio Leimer and Sam Bird are only couple of points away, and James Calado is also making his way up in the standings as the second part of the season has been very good for him.

The driver who will have the biggest pressure in the last races is Coletti. He might be leading the championship still, but during the last 4 race weekends (8 races) Coletti has managed to score points only once. Coletti and Rapax need to do some thinking as their pace hasn't been what it was in the first part of the season. Their pace needs to be much better in Monza, and another zero points finish is not going to be good for the Monegasque driver if he wants to keep fighting for the championship title. Felipe Nasr's retirement in the first race at Belgium helped Coletti keep his points lead, but he needs to watch out as Nasr has been very consistent during the whole season.

Fabio Leimer has made his way up to the top 2 by scoring good and consistent points from the races where Coletti and Nasr didn't score well. Sam Bird is going to be dangerous too as he is the man who has scored most victories this season so far. Bird grabbed his first pole position of the season in Belgium, and if he can continue having a good qualifying pace, it will help him to score more good points in feature races. The season is definitely getting exciting as the top 5 in the championship are covered by 24 points. There are now 5 drivers who can win the championship, and everyone wants to do their best. The pressure will be very high for everyone. Make sure you follow us as the championship continues this week at another very legendary racing track: Monza.