Alfonso de Orleans-Borbon has lauded Javier Villa after his protégé came of age with his maiden GP2 victory in Magny-Cours' sprint race, as the Spaniard became the series' youngest-ever winner on Sunday.
What's more, Villa's success was a welcome tonic for a team still in shock after witnessing new-signing Ernesto Viso's horrifying crash the previous day, from which the Venezuelan emerged mercifully unscathed. Having finished an encouraging seventh in the longer feature, Villa began Sunday's race from the front row of the grid, and combined a mixture of speed, aggression and maturity beyond his years to seal his debut triumph at such a high level.
Conditions were extremely tricky as the cars started their warm-up lap following earlier rain, and to make life harder still recent track re-surfacing had made it almost impossible for the drivers to ‘read' the tarmac and spot any dry lines. As the lights went out the Racing Engineering ace tucked in behind pole-sitter Nicolas Lapierre into the first corner. Although the Frenchman initially pulled away, by lap four and more sure of the conditions, Villa was beginning to close back in again.
With Lapierre, Villa and Luca Filippi edging away from the rest of the pack, it looked set to be a three-horse tussle for supremacy. Then on lap 16 Villa's persistence paid off as the race leader locked his brakes heavily on the entrance to the Adelaide hairpin and skated off the track.
Over the remaining laps, the GP2 sophomore kept his head in the tricky conditions and coped admirably with the return of the rain with five laps to go to hold the pursuing Filippi and Saturday winner Giorgio Pantano at bay, ultimately taking the chequered flag six tenths of a second to the good. The Racing Engineering team members leant over the pit wall waving and cheering as the 19-year-old crossed the line, taking his slowing down lap punching the air in delight.
