Recently-crowned champion Romain Grosjean showed that he has no intention of allowing anyone else to steal final round glory as the inaugural GP2 Asia Series comes to a close in Dubai, heading a typically close-fought practice session to open the weekend.
The Frenchman, who stunned the series regulars by taking a double victory when GP2 Asia kicked off at the same venue in January, set the pace in the half-hour free practice session with a lap of 1min 42.055secs, but had a host of potential winners in close contention.
Luca Filippi, still chasing a victory to end a luckless campaign, posed the biggest threat to Grosjean, lapping just 0.014secs slower than the ART Grand Prix man to take second spot in a top ten that featured representatives of nine different teams. Only tenth-placed Qi Meritus Mahara team-mate Hiroki Yoshimoto provided a double entry in the leading group, as the top 14 runners all lapped within a second of the pace.
Double race winner Kamui Kobayashi took third spot for DAMS, heading a gaggle of three drivers - along with Karun Chandhok and Vitaly Petrov - lying a couple of tenths shy of Grosjean, while Adrian Valles, the surprising Jason Tahinci, Davide Valsecchi, Sebastien Buemi and Yoshimoto in the top ten. Kobayashi and Petrov still have much to fight for this weekend, with second in the championship still up for grabs, while Valles and Buemi are among those battling for third overall.
While practice can mean little in terms of either qualifying or race results, two further third-place candidates - Bruno Senna and Fairuz Fauzy - will hope to improve after trailing in twelfth and 15th respectively.
Having topped the opening day of World Series testing in Barcelona, Marco Bonanomi jetted in to Dubai to take 13th in practice for Piquet Sports, but there was no such fortune for another like WSbR runner, Roldan Rodriguez, who failed to complete a lap after replacing the injured Michael Herck at FMS International.
![Romain Grosjean - ART Grand Prix [pic credit: GP2 Series]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/404216.jpg)
