page_title: 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round
section_title: Feature race
hierarchical_section_title: 2015 Bahrain GP2 Series round / Report / Races / Feature race
caption_attribution_description: Alexander Rossi at the 2013 Goodwood Festival of Speed
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 first race began at 13:10 Arabia Standard Time (UTC+3) on 18 April. The weather at the start of the race was sunny and hot with an air temperature of 30 °C (86 °F) and a track temperature of 49 °C (120 °F) with winds making the track dusty. When the race started, Vandoorne maintained his pole position advantage heading into the first corner. His teammate Matsushita made a slow start, and his anti-stall system activated, allowing several cars to get ahead of him before he got up to speed. Nato moved from seventh to third while Lynn inherited second position. Sørensen's car was damaged while hold off an overtake by de Jong. Rossi overtook his teammate King for seventh place on the same lap and started to close up to Pic and Gasly. Sørensen drove into the pit lane to retire because of the damage sustained from de Jong's pass.
  Marciello used DRS on the fourth lap to close to Nato into the first turn while battling him for fourth place. As the two drivers battled through turn four, Pic got ahead of them. Nato changed his line by braking for the seventh corner, and Marciello made an aggressive pass, causing both drivers to make contact with Pic, sending him spinning backwards. Gasly arrived at the apex of the turn and was collected by Pic who drove into Marciello. Pic, Gasly and Marciello retired immediately and the safety car was deployed. Drivers who had started on the soft-compound tyres elected to change to the medium compound tyres during their mandatory pit stops, which meant they rejoined the race outside of the top ten. These drivers had to hope that the medium compound tyres would last until the end of the race while pushing hard. Marciello entered the pit lane to retire. King was forced to wait behind Rossi during the pit stop phase and fell to 17th.
  Vandoorne remained with his intended strategy and led the field back up to speed at the lap-nine restart, ahead of Haryanto and Leal. He fended off an attempted overtake by Haryanto heading into the first corner, while Leal fell to fifth after he was passed by Matsushita and Visoiu. While in traffic, Lynn attempted to pass Rossi heading into the first turn, but made contact with the rear of his car and sustained front wing damage. Rossi pushed hard and moved ahead of Amberg by the twelfth lap. He caught up to Stanaway and quickly overtook him, and passed Berthon with the use of DRS two laps later. Rossi made further use of the system to get ahead of de Jong and Markelov. It allowed him to build a large gap to Lynn who was struggling. Rossi overtook Leal to move into fifth on lap 15, and the drivers who were running in the middle of the field made their mandatory tyre pit stops. Evans overtook Lynn into turn one on the 18th lap. Lynn reported that his car had tyre degradation problems and lost positions, while cars who conserved their tyres took advantage.
  Matsushita made a pit stop at the end of lap 20, moving Rossi into fourth place. Rossi was approximately ten seconds behind Vandoorne which meant the latter would be unable to remain the leader after his pit stop. Vandoorne made his pit stop at the end of the 22nd lap, and was delayed while his pit crew installed his right-front tyre, losing him time. He reemerged in tenth place. The rest of the leaders made their pit stops promoting Rossi into the lead on lap 23. Rossi was 6.7 seconds ahead of second-placed Evans who was battling with King. He overtook Evans for second on lap 25, although Evans used DRS to reclaim the position. Vandoorne was more than 20 seconds behind the race leader, but his new, soft-compound tyres allowed him to record lap times five seconds faster than Rossi. The battle between Evans and King allowed Rossi to pull away and created an obstruction giving Vandoorne an advantage which he took. He passed King with DRS to claim third on lap 28, and then Evans soon after. Rossi led Vandoorne by nine seconds with four laps remaining with the latter lapping three seconds faster in clean air.
  Rossi struggled with severe tyre degradation and increasingly locked and flat-spotted his tyres. Vandoorne had r
caption: Alexander Rossi (pictured in 2013) finished in third place.
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