Stanaway wins Sochi sprint race as Vandoorne secures GP2 title

Just behind there was also contact between Marlon Stockinger and Rene Binder.

All eyes were on Series leader Vandoorne and his title rival Rossi: the Belgian topped the timesheets midway through the session, but the American bettered Vandoorne’s laptime by two tenths with ten minutes left on the clock.

Stanaway took the lead at Turn 2, running side-by-side with polesitter Arthur Pic before the Frenchman went off track.

Vandoorne tried time and time again to find a way past Marciello but he couldn’t make a move stick and was soon hassled from Gasly, who took advantage of Pic locking up at Turn 13.

With Haryanto dramatically eating into Stanaway’s lead it looked as though the race was coming to a thrilling climax, but then Cecotto flew off into a heavy impact with the barriers in turn 3 to trigger a second safety vehicle on the penultimate lap of the race.

With world champions Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso both confirmed at McLaren for 2016, Vandoorne may have to settle for a season as team reserve – a position now held by Denmark’s Kevin Magnussen.

Stanaway reclaimed his position feeling it was rightly his own and was greeted by the chequered flag a lap later to add another win to the one he was able to get in Monaco earlier this year.

Haryanto contested on the podium afterwards that he was ahead when the safety auto came out and said he would wait to see if the stewards choose to take any action. Gasly, who took a podium the day before in the Feature Race, ran a fantastic race in order to come home fifth ahead of Alexander Rossi, Norman North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and Mitch Evans.

Feature race victor Rossi was sixth ahead of Nobuharu Matsushita, who picked up his first points since winning the sprint race in Hungary.

With Stanaway seemingly clear out in front, the main on-track battle was between Marciello and Vandoorne, who were closing in on second place man Haryanto by 0.5 seconds a lap. The McLaren test and development driver joins the likes of Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton, Nico Hulkenberg, Pastor Maldonado, Romain Grosjean and Jolyon Palmer as GP2 Series champion.