page_title: 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round / Report / Background
caption_attribution_description: The Back Straight at Bahrain
context_page_description: The 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round was a pair of one-make single seater motor races held on 18 and 19 April 2015 at the Bahrain International Circuit in Sakhir, Bahrain as part of the GP2 Series. It was the first round of the 2015 GP2 Series and was run in support of the 2015 Bahrain Grand Prix. The first race, a 32-lap feature event, was won by ART Grand Prix driver Stoffel Vandoorne from pole position. Rio Haryanto finished second for the Campos Racing team, and Racing Engineering driver Alexander Rossi took third. Haryanto won the second event, a 23-lap sprint race, ahead of Vandoorne in second, and Lazarus driver Nathanaël Berthon in third.
  Vandoorne retained his pole position advantage in the first race, which was disrupted on the fourth lap following a collision between Norman Nato, Arthur Pic, Pierre Gasly and Raffaele Marciello. Drivers on the soft-compound tyres made pit stops for medium-compound tyres, while Vandoorne remained the leader for the lap-nine restart. He held it until his pit stop at the end of lap 22, and Rossi took the lead on the following lap. He kept the position until Vandoorne overtook him to win the race.
context_section_description: The 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round was the first of eleven scheduled events in 2015. It was held on 18 and 19 April 2015 at the Bahrain International Circuit in Sakhir, and was run in support of the 2015 Bahrain Grand Prix. The drag reduction system (DRS) had two activation zones for the race: one was on the start/finish straight linking the final and first corners, and the second on the straight from the tenth and eleventh turns. Tyre supplier Pirelli brought two types of tyre to the race: two dry compounds – soft "options" and medium "primes".
  The final mass test session before the new season took place at the track over 1–3 April. On the first day, in hot weather, Mitch Evans (Russian Time) set the fastest lap of the morning session with a time of 1 minute, 42.479 seconds, with Jordan King (Racing Engineering) setting the quickest lap of the day in the afternoon session with a 1 minute, 41.494 seconds. An overnight sandstorm delayed the second day of testing for an hour while officials cleaned the track. Sergey Sirotkin (Rapax) was the fastest driver in the morning session with a lap of 1 minute, 41.797 seconds, and Nobuharu Matsushita (ART Grand Prix) recorded the quickest lap of the afternoon session with a time of 1 minute, 40.191 seconds. Pierre Gasly (DAMS) recorded the fastest lap time of the three days, a 1 minute, 39.632 seconds in the morning session, and Nigel Melker was the quickest driver in the afternoon session with a lap of 1 minute, 41.566 seconds. Hilmer Motorsport elected to miss the round as they were unable to acquire the services of a driver who could bring financial backing to the team. Team principal Franz Hilmer was confident that he would enter the second round of the season in Catalunya.
caption: Bahrain International Circuit, where the race was held.
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