Sébastien Buemi has made a little bit of GP2 Series history by becoming the first driver to win a race when starting outside the top ten during the Magny-Cours sprint race.
The Swiss driver took advantage of a drying circuit to romp home victorious from Arden team-mate Yelmer Buurman having started down in 21st position.
Making up for the disappointment of his retirement in the feature race whilst running in the point's positions, Buemi used his lowly starting position as an opportunity to risk fitting slick tyres on a greasy circuit.
After weathering a slippery first few laps, Buemi forged his way up the order when those in front of him began pitting for a more suitable set of rubber allowing himself, Buurman and Alvaro Parente into a comfortable position at the front of the field.
Having dispatched Parente when the Portuguese driver made a mistake, Buemi set about breaking the gap down to Buurman, one that had risen to six seconds. However, with the Dutchman struggling with his wet set-up in the now dry conditions, Buemi quickly caught and passed him with an exciting side-by-side exchange towards the Adelaide Hairpin.
“I'm really happy with this win! It is really good for me and the team, and we are back in third in the championship, we started in P21: it's just unbelievable!
“I didn't think it was possible. I was hoping for the rain maybe to make things a little bit harder, maybe to have possibility to come back, but I didn't think we had the possibility to do so much.
"It's just really good that we didn't know what to take but we made the right decision, and from there I did a really good race and the team did well. It went like a dream...”
His first win in the main series having already won a race in the preceding Asian Championship, Buemi labelled the win as the best in his fledgling career.
“I think so, yes” he said when asked. “Because from so far back it's just ... really good.
“We were so far back that we thought we need to try something, even if it doesn't work at least we've tried, and my engineer wanted to go on slicks, I wanted to go on wet tyres, and he said we're going on slicks! I'm really thankful he did because it was just the right decision to do.”
![Arden pairing Yelmer Buurman [left] and Sebastien Buemi celebrate on the Magny-Cours podium [pic credit: GP2 Media]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/458060.jpg)
