Alvaro Parente showed yesterday why he is one of the most talented drivers of the world motorsport scene and, with a fantastic race in the majestic Spa-Francorchamps circuit, he achieved a fantastic second place.

It was hard for the Portuguese youngster to do better than he did, as he fought head to head with Pastor Maldonado, the championship leader with six wins, even though he didn’t participate in this year’s championship since its beginning, due to the lack of financial support.

After a hard qualifying with lots of red flags, the young driver started from sixteenth but, as usual, he tackled the race with his fighting spirit and in the end of the first lap he was already eleventh, overtaking two more drivers in the following laps.

With a strategy based on a late stop, to prevent him to be in a wet track with slick tyres, Alvaro Parente reached first place and, with a strong pace, he opened a good gap to the drivers behind him, who were unable to follow him.

The Coloni driver pitted just three laps from the end, something that left him in the second place. However, Alvaro Parente’s will to win didn’t leave him pleased with the second position and, in the last two laps, he recover the five seconds of disadvantage he had to Maldonado, the leader, who had to assume a defensive tactic in the last corner to guarantee the win.

The driver from Oporto almost won, but he was very happy with the second place that he achieved in his GP2 return. “It was an amazing race, it went very well! I didn’t know the car in the dry, but it was very balanced and, with a good strategy, we were in the fresh air, something that allowed me to be very fast and open a gap to my followers. When I left the pits I felt that I could try to win and I gave my best – I ended on Maldonado’s back, but this second place is fantastic! I want to thank to the team for this opportunity and for a very balanced single-seater, said the Portuguese driver, who won the 2009 Belgian main GP2 race.