Switzerland need to register just two points more than chief title rivals New Zealand in order to wrap up the 2007/08 A1GP laurels ahead of the season finale at
Brands Hatch next month, after Neel Jani produced another imperious performance to lead from lights-to-flag in the Shanghai sprint race.
The 24-year-old never put a foot wrong as he converted his pole position into an unchallenged victory in the Chinese city – his fourth success of the current campaign. By dint of taking fastest lap too, and with Jonny Reid failing to score, he has also put his country within touching distance of the crown.
Having stormed to the top spot in qualifying by the best part of half a second, Jani went on to pull out a daunting two second lead within three laps of the race having got underway. He would take the chequered flag almost five seconds ahead of Canada's Robert Wickens, the Toronto native making his final appearance of the season this weekend.
Wickens narrowly held off front row starter Filipe Albuquerque to seal the runner-up spot, with his Portuguese rival again turning heads as he secured his second rostrum finish in just three meetings in the nation vs nation series. Indeed, the 23-year-old only missed out on second place after an error early on allowed Wickens past, and though he put pressure on the Maple Leaf car throughout the race, no similar mistakes were forthcoming.
Malaysia's Alex Yoong made a superb start to shoot up the order from seventh to fourth, and he would remain there for the duration, coming home just under a second ahead of fellow former grand prix ace Narain Karthikeyan in the Indian machine. Karthikeyan in turn successfully fended off German Michael Ammermüller, South Africa's Adrian Zaugg and Edoardo Piscopo for Italy in sixth, seventh and eighth places respectively.
![Neel Jani - A1 Team Switzerland [pic credit: A1 GP Media]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/398992.jpg)
