2016 Red Bull Ring GP2 Series round

Following the Baku round, Nobuharu Matsushita was suspended from competing in the Austrian GP2 round due to erratic driving that caused several collisions during the restarts.^[1] On 28 June, ART Grand Prix announced René Binder as Matsushita's replacement.^[2]

Qualifying

Arden International GP2 driver, Jimmy Eriksson will carry through a three-place grid penalty from the previous round after GP2 stewards deemed him to be at fault in the collision between himself and Jordan King.

Sergey Sirotkin achieved the fastest time of 1:13.663, thereby achieving his second pole position of the year. Antonio Giovinazzi narrowly missed out by six-thousandths of a second and Pierre Gasly occupied third. The session however, ended under yellow flags after Jimmy Eriksson's car stopped at turn seven.

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Time	Grid
1	2	Sergey Sirotkin	ART Grand Prix	1:13.663	1
2	20	Antonio Giovinazzi	Prema Racing	1:13.669	2
3	21	Pierre Gasly	Prema Racing	1:13.803	3
4	15	Luca Ghiotto	Trident	1:14.091	4
5	10	Artem Markelov	Russian Time	1:14.099	5
6	9	Raffaele Marciello	Russian Time	1:14.184	6
7	22	Oliver Rowland	MP Motorsport	1:14.316	7
8	5	Alex Lynn	DAMS	1:14.387	8
9	3	Norman Nato	Racing Engineering	1:14.456	9
10	7	Mitch Evans	Pertamina Campos Racing	1:14.574	10
11	24	Nabil Jeffri	Arden International	1:14.626	14 1
12	19	Marvin Kirchhöfer	Carlin	1:14.647	11
13	12	Arthur Pic	Rapax	1:14.688	12
14	4	Jordan King	Racing Engineering	1:14.815	13
15	18	Sergio Canamasas	Carlin	1:14.832	17 2
16	1	René Binder	ART Grand Prix	1:14.886	15
17	6	Nicholas Latifi	DAMS	1:14.958	20 3
18	11	Gustav Malja	Rapax	1:15.020	16
19	8	Sean Gelael	Pertamina Campos Racing	1:15.112	18
20	23	Daniël de Jong	MP Motorsport	1:15.307	19
21	25	Jimmy Eriksson	Arden International	1:15.531	PL 4
22	14	Philo Paz Armand	Trident	1:15.675	21
Source:[3]

Notes

1.^ – Jeffri received a three-place grid penalty after having failed to slow down under yellow flag conditions.^[4]

2.^ – Canamasas received a three-place grid penalty after having been deemed to impede a fellow driver.^[4]

3.^ – Latifi received a three-place grid penalty after having been deemed to impede a fellow driver.^[4]

4.^ – Eriksson received a three-place grid penalty adhered from the previous round in Baku. Arden subsequently elected to start him from the pitlane.^[5]

Feature Race

The Feature Race for GP2 was delayed by 15 minutes due to incidents that occurred in the preceding Formula One qualifying session. The race saw changing conditions that effected the outcome of the race. While the bottom of the circuit would be dry, heavy rainfall would be at the top. Gasly spun from the lead which triggered a safety car and a flurry of pitstops. On lap 28, Marvin Kirchhöfer also spun, which triggered another safety car. Upon exiting the pitlane shortly thereafter, Artem Markelov hit the wall on pit exit, prompting a red flag due to damage to the track. After a lengthy delay, the race was restarted behind the safety car with the Campos pair of Mitch Evans and Sean Gelael leading and Philo Paz Armand, who incurred a penalty after overtaking the safety car. Raffaele Marciello began to charge through the field on fresh super soft tyres, but as the pace in the compound started to fade away, Evans took control and won his first race of the season.

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	7	Mitch Evans	Campos Racing	40	1:18:32.399	10	25 (2)
2	8	Sean Gelael	Campos Racing	40	+4.600	18	18
3	9	Raffaele Marciello	Russian Time	40	+10.789	6	15
4	15	Luca Ghiotto	Trident	40	+12.363	4	12
5	25	Jimmy Eriksson	Arden International	40	+12.691	PL	10
6	22	Oliver Rowland	MP Motorsport	40	+15.557	7	8
7	3	Norman Nato	Racing Engineering	40	+16.559	9	6
8	4	Jordan King	Racing Engineering	40	+22.762	13	4
9	12	Arthur Pic	Rapax	40	+24.738	12	2
10	6	Nicholas Latifi	DAMS	40	+25.629	20	1
11	5	Alex Lynn	DAMS	40	+27.000	8
12 1	2	Sergey Sirotkin	ART Grand Prix	40	+29.708	1	(4)
13 2	11	Gustav Malja	Rapax	40	+30.258	16
14	23	Daniël de Jong	MP Motorsport	39	+1 Lap	19
15	14	Philo Paz Armand	Trident	39	+1 Lap	21
16	1	René Binder	ART Grand Prix	38	+2 Laps	15
Ret	20	Antonio Giovinazzi	Prema Racing	29	Ignition	2
Ret	10	Artem Markelov	Russian Time	28	Accident	5
Ret	19	Marvin Kirchhöfer	Carlin	26	Spun off	11
Ret	21	Pierre Gasly	Prema Racing	17	Spun off	3
Ret	24	Nabil Jeffri	Arden International	1	Collision damage	14
Ret	18	Sergio Canamasas	Carlin	0	Collision	17
Fastest lap: Mitch Evans (Campos Racing) – 1:15.534 (on lap 38)
Source:[3]

Notes

1.^ – Sirotkin was given a ten-second time penalty for failing to re-establish his original starting position before the safety car line and of failing to re-enter the pitlane.^[6]

2.^ – Malja was given a ten-second time penalty for passing several cars as well as the safety car between turns seven and eight during the safety car period without permission from the Race Director.^[6]

Sprint Race

The Sprint Race was held under atrocious conditions, with rain affecting the entire race. This would catch out drivers throughout the race and would lead to two safety cars. The first of which came as a result of Sean Gelael retiring after being hit by Arthur Pic on lap three. The second safety car came after Nicholas Latifi spun on the exit of turn one on lap ten. By this stage, the circuit was beginning to dry and some drivers elected to pit for dry tyres in an attempt to take advantage of the changing conditions. However, the track had not dried out sufficiently by this stage and so saw most of the competitors struggling for grip for the first few laps into the stint. As well as this, the restart was prompt and the group that had pitted for dry tyres were left far behind the leading pack by the time of the restart. In the end, Racing Engineering's Jordan King completed a dominant performance and earned his first GP2 win and Racing Engineering's second of the season.

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	4	Jordan King	Racing Engineering	28	44:34.966	1	15 (2)
2	22	Oliver Rowland	MP Motorsport	28	+6.019	3	12
3	5	Alex Lynn	DAMS	28	+7.702	11	10
4	9	Raffaele Marciello	Russian Time	28	+10.234	6	8
5	20	Antonio Giovinazzi	Prema Racing	28	+10.417	17	6
6	2	Sergey Sirotkin	ART Grand Prix	28	+11.821	12	4
7	21	Pierre Gasly	Prema Racing	28	+12.594	20	2
8	7	Mitch Evans	Campos Racing	28	+12.881	8	1
9	15	Luca Ghiotto	Trident	28	+15.878	5
10	18	Sergio Canamasas	Carlin	28	+35.019	22
11	10	Artem Markelov	Russian Time	28	+57.740	18
12	3	Norman Nato	Racing Engineering	28	+1:00.076	2
13	25	Jimmy Eriksson	Arden International	28	+1:00.107	4
14	14	Philo Paz Armand	Trident	28	+1:16.880	15
15	1	René Binder	ART Grand Prix	28	+1:17.325	16
16	11	Gustav Malja	Rapax	27	+1 Lap	13
17	24	Nabil Jeffri	Arden International	27	+1 Lap	21
18	12	Arthur Pic	Rapax	27	+1 Lap	9
19	19	Marvin Kirchhöfer	Carlin	27	+1 Lap	19
20	23	Daniel de Jong	MP Motorsport	27	+1 Lap	14
Ret	6	Nicholas Latifi	DAMS	20	Spun off	10
Ret	8	Sean Gelael	Campos Racing	3	Collision damage	7
Fastest lap: Jordan King (Racing Engineering) – 1:25.150 (on lap 27)
Source:[3]

Teams' Championship standings

	Pos	Team	Points
	1	Russian Time	120
1	2	Racing Engineering	100
1	3	Prema Racing	99
3	4	Campos Racing	80
	5	DAMS	72

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

• 2016 Austrian Grand Prix
• 2016 Red Bull Ring GP3 Series round

• Official website of GP2 Series