Nico Müller flies to victory in Budapest

Jenzer Motorsport’s Nico Müller continued his impressive display in Hungary during Race 1 this afternoon by taking a lights to flag victory. The Swiss driver has been untouchable since arriving at the Hungaroring and romped to victory after a dream start. All throughout the race he held off Esteban Gutiérrez to take his second win of the season.

Behind the leader ART Grand Prix’s Gutiérrez had a less than ideal start to his race from second place. The Mexican was passed off the line by a charging Robert Wickens who drove his Status GP car clean past Gutiérrez and Tech 1 Racing’s Stefano Coletti from fourth off the line. A battle for second and third ensued between all three drivers entering turn 3 with Gutiérrez eventually sealing the spot ahead of Coletti, and Wickens slotting into fourth.

Further down the grid Josef Newgarden was up into ninth spot and had his sights firmly set on eighth and reverse pole for tomorrow’s race. The Carlin driver was all over the back of ART’s Alexander Rossi and passed his fellow countryman for the final point of race and set off in search of Feliz da Costa in seventh. At the front race leader Müller and Gutiérrez were swapping fastest laps and started to pull away from Coletti in third.

With just five laps to go Newgarden had lost ground to Felix Da Costa and was once again locked in battle with Rossi. Felix Da Costa had pulled away in search of Addax Team’s Mirko Bortolotti in sixth spot and Wickens and Carlin’s Dean Smith were comfortably in fourth and fifth spots.

Rossi was pushing Newgarden hard on the final lap of the race but looked like finishing just outside the points in ninth – that was until sixth place man Bortolotti began slowing just before the checkered flag. The Italian was set for 3 points before fuel pressure problems meant he eventually crossed the line in eleventh gifting Rossi the final point for the race and reverse grid pole for Race 2 tomorrow, next to Newgarden for an all American front row. Felix Da Costa moved up into sixth and Newgarden took seventh. Far from the drama, Muller scored his second win of the season 1.450s ahead of Series leader Gutierrez and Coletti.

The Mexican increases his lead in the drivers’ standings by another four points to 34. The ART driver now has 73 points compared to Wickens in second with 39. Nico Muller has moved in front of Rossi to take third with 35 points. ART are now leading the team’s standing’s by 48 – the French team have 102 points in total.

The action continues tomorrow at 09:25 local time with Race 2.

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