Doornbos wins Algarve sprint race

Date published : 12 Apr 2009 - 10:44:10

Robert Doornbos cruised to victory in the A1GP sprint race at the Algarve circuit.The Team Netherlands driver out-dragged polesitter Vitantonio Liuzzi (Italy) into the first corner and was never seriously challenged after that. Liuzzi could not match his qualifying pace in the race, and as he held up the chasing pack, Doornbos built up a lead that kept him comfortably ahead during the pitstop phase.Both Ireland's Adam Carroll and Portuguese favourite Filipe Albuquerque jumped ahead of the Team Italy car during the stops, and they claimed the other podium slots. On a clear track and on fresh tyres, Carroll set the fastest lap to boost Team Ireland's title chances.Liuzzi came home fourth, ahead of Team Monaco's Clivio Piccione and India's Narain Karthikeyan, who had an entertaining dice for fifth.The race was cut short following a bizarre accident involving Team Brazil's Felipe Guimaraes and Adrian Zaugg's South Africa car. Zaugg was running two laps down after suffering a technical problem at the start, and as Guimaraes, who was running seventh, was coming up to lap him the Brazilian appeared to misjudge the width of his car and sideswiped the South African, causing severe damage to both machines.Neel Jani charged up to eighth from last on the grid, but the Swiss team did not get its point as Jani was adjudged to have stopped outside the pit window.The race was red-flagged before he had taken his stop and go, so a time penalty was applied. This promoted Fairy Fauzy and Team Malaysia to eighth.