By Ben Anderson Saturday, May 14th 2011, 14:59 GMT
F3 Snetterton podiumKevin Magnussen produced two outstanding round-the-outside passes to claim his maiden British Formula 3 victory in this afternoon's first race at Snetterton.
The Dane made a slow start from second on the grid and dropped to third, behind a fast-starting Riki Christodoulou.
Magnussen (Carlin) then reclaimed the place at the start of the third lap by going round the outside of Christodoulou's Hitech-run Dallara into the ultra-fast double-apex turn one at Riches.
A mid-race safety car erased poleman Felipe Nasr's early advantage, before Magnussen repeated his earlier move at the re-start to take the lead.
From there he reeled off the last half-dozen laps to seal the win by just 0.616 seconds from Nasr.
"I had a pretty good race - not the best of starts, but I recovered well," Magnussen said. "Luckily we got the safety car and that was my chance to do Nasr. It's a big relief to finally get my first win after a tough start to the season."
Colombian Carlos Huertas claimed his second podium of the season when Christodoulou dropped back to sixth a couple of laps after losing second to Magnussen.
Rupert Svendsen-Cook completed a Carlin clean-sweep of the top four places, while Christodoulou eventually recovered to fifth by passing team-mate Pietro Fantin.
Double R's Pipo Derani ran fifth early on, but was given a drive-through penalty for being out of position at the start. He eventually came home 13th.
Category veteran Hywel Lloyd put in a strong run to take seventh for Sino Vision, ahead of Fortec trio Harry Tincknell, Will Buller and Lucas Foresti.
Results - 26 laps:
Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap
1 Kevin Magnussen Carlin Dallara-VW 30m54.041s
2. Felipe Nasr Carlin Dallara-VW + 0.616s
3. Carlos Huertas Carlin Dallara-VW + 3.373s
4. Rupert Svendsen-Cook Carlin Dallara-VW + 5.255s
5. Riki Christodoulou Hitech Dallara-VW + 8.051s
6. Pietro Fantin Hitech Dallara-VW + 8.542s
7. Hywel Lloyd Sino Vision Dallara-Merc + 11.238s
8. Harry Tincknell Fortec Dallara-Merc + 11.906s
9. William Buller Fortec Dallara-Merc + 12.016s
10. Lucas Foresti Fortec Dallara-Merc + 13.427s
11. Yann Cunha T-Sport Dallara-VW + 15.210s
12. Adderly Fong Sino Vision Dallara-Merc + 19.791s
13. Pipo Derani Double R Dallara-Merc + 23.081s
14. Menasheh Idafar T-Sport Dallara-VW + 23.729s
15. Jack Harvey Carlin Dallara-VW + 26.026s
16. Jazeman Jaafar Carlin Dallara-VW + 26.952s
17. Bart Hylkema T-Sport Dallara-Mugen + 28.744s
18. Kotaro Sakurai Hitech Dallara-Mugen + 34.746s
Retirements:
Scott Pye Double R Dallara-Merc 6 laps
Fahmi Ilyas Fortec Dallara-Merc 4 laps