Monza: Josef Newgarden race 1 report

NEWGARDEN TAKES SOLID SEVENTH PLACE FINISH

Josef Newgarden finished the GP3 feature race from Monza in a solid seventh position, scoring two valuable championship points and securing a front row starting position for Sunday's race.

The talented, young American got a strong start off the line, but as the field headed down to the first corner, Newgarden was pushed to the outside. The cars arrived at the Rettifilo chicane in a bottleneck formation, and Newgarden found himself with no space to turn into the corner. The Carlin driver was forced across the kerbs, and though he was able to re- join the race track immediately, he had dropped just outside the top 10.

Newgarden fought his way back up to sixth position, in an impressive display of speed, race craft and maturity. Towards the end of the race and struggling slightly with his brakes, Newgarden locked the left-front wheel and flat spotted the tyre. Frustratingly, he conceded sixth position to Mirko Bortolotti, who managed to edge past the #14 Carlin car, but Newgarden remained on the pace. Setting the second fastest lap of the race, and coming across the line just 4.8 seconds behind the winner, Newgarden took a deserved seventh place finish.

Speaking about the race, the 19 year-old American said: "The start lost me quite a few places, and really the rest of the race was all about recovering from that. It's going to be a tough race tomorrow, but hopefully I'll be able to get a good start from the front. It would obviously be a great end to the year if we were able to convert the promise we've shown throughout 2010."

The result will see Newgarden line-up in second position for the final race of the season, scheduled to get underway on Sunday morning at 09:25 (local time.)

-source: josef newgarden