» GP2: Nato cruises to victory at Monza

Norman Nato claimed a dominant win in the Italian GP2 Series Sprint Race at Monza, his second victory of the 2016 season.

The Frenchman made a flying start from fourth on the grid to lead on the first lap ahead of Racing Engineering teammate Jordan King.

Mitch Evans, the race’s polesitter and a winner last year at Monza, made a poor getaway and his woes were compounded when he was punted into retirement at the Roggia chicane by Gustav Malja. He was joined in retirement by Luca Ghiotto, who was similarly turfed out of the race at the same corner by Oliver Rowland.

Racing was briefly suspended by a Virtual Safety Car to retrieve the stricken cars before the action resumed on Lap 2. Nato immediately pulled away from King, who acted as an effective rear gunner against the chasing pack headed by championship leader Pierre Gasly.

King and Gasly staged a lengthy and entertaining scrap for second place before Gasly finally managed to get by, but he ran out of laps to close down Nato who cruised to victory by a margin of more than four seconds over his French compatriot.

King was also overtaken by Feature race winner Antonio Giovinazzi, Gasly’s chief title rival, who overcame a scare on the opening lap when he sailed across the Roggia chicane’s run-off. The Italian was able to recover, but in finishing behind Gasly the points margin between the duo has now extended to ten.

King struggled with fading tyres and was passed by Gustav Malja for fourth place, and only narrowly held out Artem Markelov on a sprint to the finish line. The Briton’s fifth place became fourth when Malja was subsequently awarded a post-race time penalty for his first-lap contact with Evans.

Markelov too was penalised – hit with a heavier 20-second time penalty – for failing to slow sufficiently during the Virtual Safety Car period. The same penalty was also handed to Nicholas Latifi, who was originally classified in eighth place.

The penalties shook up the final classification, with Alex Lynn and Nobuharu Matsushita promoted to fifth and sixth respectively after their own exciting scrap, ahead of the penalised Malja. Marvin Kirchhöfer claimed the final point for eighth place.

The GP2 Series will stage its penultimate championship round with a return to the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia on the weekend of October 1-2.

2016 GP2 Series Italy – Sprint Race Results (21 laps)
	Driver	Team / Entry	Laps	Result
1.	Norman Nato	Racing Engineering	21	33:51.821
2.	Pierre Gasly	PREMA Racing	21	+ 4.312
3.	Antonio Giovinazzi	PREMA Racing	21	+ 8.495
4.	Jordan King	Racing Engineering	21	+ 12.775
5.	Alex Lynn	DAMS	21	+ 13.576
6.	Nobuharu Matsushita	ART Grand Prix	21	+ 13.586
7.	Gustav Malja*	Rapax	21	+ 21.526
8.	Marvin Kirchhöfer	Carlin	21	+ 22.566
9.	Oliver Rowland	MP Motorsport	21	+ 29.225
10.	Artem Markelov*	RUSSIAN TIME	21	+ 32.813
11.	Arthur Pic	Rapax	21	+ 34.192
12.	Nabil Jeffri	Arden International	21	+ 34.194
13.	Sergio Canamasas	Carlin	21	+ 36.845
14.	Raffaele Marciello	RUSSIAN TIME	21	+ 40.665
15.	Nicholas Latifi*	DAMS	21	+ 41.503
16.	Sean Gelael	Pertamina Campos Racing	21	+ 44.059
17.	Philo Paz Armand	Trident	21	+ 48.628
18.	Jimmy Eriksson	Arden International	20	1 lap behind
19.	Daniël de Jong	MP Motorsport	20	1 lap behind
	Not Classified	Team / Entry	Laps
DNF.	Sergey Sirotkin	ART Grand Prix	6	Mechanical
DNF.	Mitch Evans	Pertamina Campos Racing	0	Collision
DNF.	Luca Ghiotto	Trident	0	Collision

*Post-Race Penalties:

Gustav Malja – who was originally classified 4th – was awarded a 10-second post-race time penalty for causing an avoidable collision with Mitch Evans.
Artem Markelov – who was originally classified 6th – was awarded a drive-through penalty (applied as a 20-second post-race time penalty) for failing to slow sufficiently during the Virtual Safety Car period.
Nicholas Latifi – who was originally classified in 8th – was awarded a drive-through penalty (applied as a 20-second post-race time penalty) for failing to slow sufficiently during the Virtual Safety Car period.

Image via GP2 Series Media