Prema Racing’s Antonio Giovinazzi claimed his first ever victory in GP2 after a dramatic feature race around the new Baku City Circuit.
The Italian driver took pole position in the postponed GP2 qualifying session in Azerbaijan but a slow start and poor pitstop caused him to lose ground.
He slowly recovered and passed countryman Raffaele Marciello for the lead on lap 18, before a late safety car period to clear Norman Nato’s damaged car, after the Racing Engineering driver crashed into his team-mate Jordan King.
There were four safety car periods during the race, first for a multi-car crash on the opening lap at Turn 1 that eliminated both DAMS machines, Pierre Gasly, Sergio Canamasas and Marvin Kirchhofer.
Philo Paz Armand crashed a few laps after the restart, causing the racing action to be paused once again. Arthur Pic and Artem Markelov then collided, with the latter then crashing out.
The long final safety car for Nato’s car meant there was a two-lap dash to the flag, with Giovinazzi holding onto the lead to claim both his and Prema’s first win in GP2.
Sergey Sirotkin bounced back from his errors at the last few rounds to pip Marciello for second on the line, with the Russian Time driver in third.
Oliver Rowland, Mitch Evans, Nobuharu Matsushita, Sean Geleal and Daniel de Jong were next up. Luca Ghiotto and Gustav Malja completed the top 10.
They were also the final runners on the lead lap, with Jimmy Eriksson and Jordan King colliding on the restart. The drivers were classified two laps down.
