Tauranga's Richie Stanaway holds second place following the opening round of the GP3 motor racing series held as part of the Spanish Grand Prix weekend at Barcelona.
The Barcelona series opener was Stanaway's return to single-seater racing following his June 2012 accident in the Formula Renault 3.5 Series at theBelgian Spa-Francorchamps circuit in which he suffered a serious lower back injury.
Stanaway, 22, qualified third in the 27-car field and drove to third place in the opening 17-lap race on Saturday afternoon behind British driver Alex Lynn and Sweden's Jimmy Eriksson.
The GP3 Series race format reverses the top-eight finish positions from race one for the Sunday morning race which put Stanaway sixth on the grid for a race held on a damp track. He made a slow start on the run to first corner but recovered quickly on the slippery track to gain fifth place.
After moving to fourth place he latched on to the leading trio of British driver Dean Stoneman, Matheo Tuscher (Switzerland) and Dino Zamparelli (Great Britain) on his way to a fourth place finish. The pair of results put Stanaway second in the championship behind Saturday's race winner Alex Lynn. Lynn leads with 31 points from Stanaway with 23 and Jimmy Eriksson on 22.
