Already out of the equation were Adrian Valles, denting his chances of a top three overall championship spot, Marcelo Puglisi, who took too big a bite of Grosjean's kerb and found himself pitched into the barrier, and Christian Bakkerud, the perennially unlucky Dane having tagged Stephen Jelley in the midst of an intra-Super Nova battle with team-mate Fairuz Fauzy for the minor positions. Senna's iSport colleague, Karun Chandhok - tagged by Valsecchi - and Ben Hanley appeared to have completed the retirees, before Kobayashi, having waited until lap 27 to pit as he chased the fastest lap, clattered the barriers two laps from home.
For mush of that time, Senna appeared to have the race in his pocket, the gap to the Buemi-Grosjean battle extending all the while, but, on lap 30, the iSport car re-appeared on pit-lane, its right rear in need of attention. With little traffic to bother him, Senna must have found some of the carbon-fibre shards left from contact up and down the order - and then found that he still did not have enough in reserve to retain his lead.
Indeed, the Brazilian dropped agonisingly out of the points altogether, the pit-lane speed limit enough of a hindrance to allow not only those directly behind him through, but also everyone down to Milos Pavlovic, who inherited eighth place as Senna exited the pits.
Inheriting the lead, meanwhile, was none other than Grosjean who, having appeared to be stuck behind Buemi for the second time, somehow found a way past the Swiss driver with seven laps remaining. When Senna pitted, he led the charge past the stricken Brazilian, with Buemi and Buurman moving up a spot each to give Arden a rare podium double.
Petrov took fourth, while Bonanomi appeared on course for fifth, before having to yield to the flying Yoshimoto late on. Jerome d'Ambrosio, the first of early stoppers, gave DAMS something to hold on to after Kobayashi's crash with seventh, ahead of Pavlovic, who clung to eighth despite the hapless Senna's attentions.
![Romain Grosjean - ART Grand Prix [pic credit: GP2 Series]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/404220.jpg)
