ART Grand Prix’s Nobuharu Matsushita stormed to a surprise victory in the Formula 2 sprint race at Barcelona after a late mistake from leader Nicholas Latifi.
DAMS driver Latifi enjoyed a great start to move from third to first and opened up a comfortable lead over Matsushita.
It looked like he was going to take a controlled maiden victory in F2, but a mistake at Turn 5 in the closing stages caused him drop behind Matsushita.
He then had to defend from his team-mate Oliver Rowland, losing a place to him into the hairpin at the end of the back straight.
Matsushita inherited the lead and went on to claim a clear first victory of the 2017 F2 season, 3.3 seconds clear of Rowland in second place.
Latifi was just behind in third, his late error following on from over 20 laps in the lead of the race and denying himself the win.
Championship leader and feature race winner Charles Leclerc rallied from eighth to fourth, making up ground in final stages.
Jordan King made up ground in the last few laps to take fifth for MP Motorsport, with Gustav Malja running as high as second before a mistake flat-spotted his tyres. He finished sixth.
Luca Ghiotto was runner-up in Saturday’s race but struggled for pace and had to settle for seventh, with Alexander Albon dropping back as the race progressed to complete the top eight.
Artem Markelov started on pole position but lost several places with a poor start and continued to drop back, finishing ninth, ahead of Johnny Cecotto Jr.
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