Alex Yoong led from lights to flag to claim a maiden A1 Grand Prix series win for Team Malaysia at the final round of the World Cup of Motorsport in China.
Having turfed Great Britain's Darren Manning off pole position on Saturday, the former
F1 and CART racer gave his contemporary no right to reply by easing away throughout the 15-lap encounter at Shanghai's new International Circuit, becoming the seventh different winner in eleven A1GP rounds in the championship's inaugural season.
"The car was good, but we knew the temperature was rising and were worried about the condition of the tyres," Yoong revealed afterwards, "Fortunately, after the start, I was able to conserve the tyres and still able to push at the end.
"Hopefully, I will be able to repeat this in the feature race, but it will be very competitive in the main race. The pit-stops will be crucial and it will be really important to look after the car."
Manning survived an early scare to bring the Team GB car home in second spot, finishing just ahead of Laguna Seca winner Salvador Duran and securing third place in the championship standings with one race to run.
"That was obviously the main goal for the team, and it has been a great weekend," Manning said, "I think I have acclimatised myself now.
"I didn't have the pace of Alex in the race, but I managed to fend off France and the charging Salvador.
"I'm not really used to this two race thing, but the second race will be more like I'm used to, a long race with strategy and pit-stops, so I think past experience will help me."
"It was really difficult to pass, we were managing to do similar times, but we had different set-ups on the cars, so we were faster on different parts of the track," Duran said of his battle with the Briton, "I did try really hard one time to get past but, when that didn't work, I knew I was done, as I had no more power boosts left. Hopefully, the next race will be different."
