Salvador Duran achieves third podium of the season

 BEIJING, China  This Sunday was an historic day in motorsports, when Mexico became for the first time leader in the A1GP Series standings. This occurred after Mexican driver Salvador Duran achieved his third podium of the season, this time at the 2.2-Km. street circuit around the Jingkai exhibition centre.

   Duran's second place came in the Sprint race when he finished behind Dutchman Jeroen Bleekemolen, but the points collected in this race were enough to leave China leading the point standings, despite not having the luck on Mexico's side during the Feature race.

   Duran set the fastest lap for the Sprint race, thus he had the car and the speed to repeat a podium. Even on the first laps of the Feature race he was close to the first place and was able to pull away a bit from Italian Enrico Toccacelo, who put some pressure on Duran during the first race. Unfortunately, the gearbox of Mexico's A1 car had a problem and eventually this forced Duran to retire.

  "On the first race I ran well. I was conservative because I knew that it was going to be very hard to pass. It was a matter of being intelligent to finish the race while holding my position, to achieve a podium. For the Feature race I knew that I had to do the same, but it was also necessary to put more pressure in the front to aspire to win. I did it until the second gear was broken. In spite of this, I was able to continue a few laps in second place, but there was a time when the gearbox was not working well and I've scratched a little bit the wall. Two laps later, I had no gears down; maybe some pieces of the broken gear damaged the other gears. The team did a fantastic job, simply we had a failure and this is something that it was out of our control," Salvador Duran said.

  "Racing on this street circuit was a hard experience. It is different than racing on road courses. Here there was a lot of pressure; you had to go at the limit. The circuit was very bumpy and that damages very much the car. Overall, each track is particular in certain senses, but in a road course there is more top speed and the grip is better", he added.

A1 Grand PrixBeijingSprint Race(15 laps)(Top-5)Pos. A1 Team               Time1       Netherlands         20:28.4202.      Mexico                20:29.8843.      Italy                      20:30.7314.      Canada                 20:31.7955.      Germany              20:32.363Fastest Lap: Mexico, 59.329 at 133.5 Kph (lap 15).

A1 Grand PrixBeijingFeature Race(63 laps)(Top-5)Pos. A1 Team              Time1      Italy                    1:10'15.9192.     Great Britain        1:10'20.4273.     Australia              1:10:21.8364.     France                 1:10'28.8195.     South Africa         1:10'29.19720    Mexico                  14 lapsFastest Lap: Canada, 58.107 at 136.3 Kph (lap 39).

A1 Grand PrixChampionship Classification(Top-6)Pos. A1 Team         Points1.      Mexico               242.      Germany             223.      Great Britain        204.      Italy                    195.      Malaysia             176.      Australia             16