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Filippi Jumps Pic In Pitstops To Win Nurburgring Feature Race

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Luca Filippi won his first race after his switch to Scuderia Coloni with victory in the feature race at the Nurburgring. The Italian jumped polesitter Charles Pic during the pitstops to claim the win, his first in the main series since the end of 2009.

Pic made a good getaway at the start to retain the lead, with Filippi following him in second place. Jules Bianchi meanwhile took third place from compatriot Romain Grosjean down the inside of Turn 1.

The safety car was deployed after Pal Varhaug (who raced with a black band across the nose of his car in memory of his Norwegian compatriots killed in the Oslo attacks) made contact with Johnny Cecotto at Turn 4, putting both out of the race. Just ahead Davide Valsecchi hit the rear of Christian Vietoris's car on the exit of Turn 4, the pair losing their front wing and rear wing respectively.

After the restart the positions remained the same at the front until the pitstops began. Giedo van der Garde was the first man to stop from fifth place on lap 7. He would be able to jump Jules Bianchi after the Frenchman suffered a slower pitstop as he changed all four tyres rather than the mandatory two.

Up front Pic opened up a gap over Filippi, but stopped a lap earlier and this enabled the Italian to come out ahead. From there Filippi soon began to open up a gap over Pic, extending his advantage to 5.5 seconds before taking the checkered flag.

Pic held on in second place ahead of Grosjean, while Bianchi recovered to fourth back past van der Garde. The Dutchman came under pressure late on from Marcus Ericsson, with the Swede taking fifth under breaking for the chicane on the penultimate lap.

Alvaro Parente had held seventh place but was handed a drive through penalty in the closing stages for not respecting the track limits. This promoted the lively battle for eighth behind into a battle for seventh and the front row of the reverse grid for the sprint race.

Sam Bird had taken eighth from Clos and Turn 1 on lap 27, but the Spaniard regained the place a lap later. Once they were promoted to seventh and eighth they held their positions to the finish, with Bird keeping Fabio Leimer at bay.

Leimer had run sixth early on but lost out in the pitstops. He made contact with both Adam Carroll and Luiz Razia late on before finishing ninth.

Race results – 34 laps:

Pos Drivers Teams Gap
1 Luca Filippi Scuderia Coloni 1:01:06.975
2 Charles Pic Barwa Addax Team 5.558
3 Romain Grosjean DAMS 6.877
4 Jules Bianchi Lotus ART 33.491
5 Marcus Ericsson iSport International 37.716
6 Giedo van der Garde Barwa Addax Team 41.146
7 Dani Clos Racing Engineering 45.977
8 Sam Bird iSport International 46.461
9 Fabio Leimer Rapax 47.075
10 Rodolfo González Trident Racing 48.452
11 Johnny Cecotto Ocean Racing Technology 72.166
12 Michael Herck Scuderia Coloni 72.581
13 Esteban Gutiérrez Lotus ART 73.285
14 Davide Valsecchi Caterham Team AirAsia 73.447
15 Julian Leal Rapax 80.824
16 Adam Carroll Super Nova Racing 83.404
17 Fairuz Fauzy Super Nova Racing 85.492
18 Max Chilton Carlin 86.566
19 Josef Král Arden International 91.615
20 Jolyon Palmer Arden International +1 lap
21 Álvaro Parente Carlin +2 laps
Ret Luiz Razia Caterham Team AirAsia 29 laps
Ret Stefano Coletti Trident Racing 28 laps
Ret Christian Vietoris Racing Engineering 1 lap
Ret Pal Varhaug DAMS 0 laps
Ret Kevin Mirocha Ocean Racing Technology 0 laps
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Peter joined the TCF team in September 2010 and covers GP2 and GP3 along with WTCC and Formula Two. You can find him on twitter at @PeteAllen_
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