Jolyon Palmer showed superb pace and overtaking prowess to finish just one place off the points during today's (Sunday, 24 March) GP2 Sprint Race at Sepang, Malaysia - despite starting from the pit lane.

Drivers were greeted with light rain for the final race of the weekend with the threat of a heavy downpour on the horizon. Jolyon, starting on a new set of hard tyres, lined-up in third place after a brilliant drive yesterday saw him gain an impressive 16 places from the back of the grid.

However, the 22-year-old stalled off the line on the green flag lap, forcing him to start from the pit lane and last place. Undeterred, he set about climbing his way back up the field - just as he did yesterday - and was already lying P17 by lap five and chasing down MP Motorsport's Adrian Quaife-Hobbs ahead.

He wasted little time dispatching Quaife-Hobbs though along with a further two places in quick succession. A few laps later he produced yet another solid overtake, this time on MP's Daniel De Jong followed by Caterham's Sergio Canamasas to lie P12.

With five laps remaining, Jolyon was far from finished with the Brit taking a remarkable two places in one corner as he took full advantage of the scraping Fabio Leimer, driving for Racing Engineering, and Russian Time's Tom Dillmann.

Now in the top 10, he then overtook Lazarus' Kevin Giovesi in the closing stages, but just ran out of time before he could pass Giovesi's team-mate Rene Binder, finishing just 0.6s behind and completing a weekend tally of 33 positions gained.

Speaking afterwards Jolyon said: "Unfortunately I stalled at the start so had to start from the pit lane. The pace was very strong though and I managed to pass a lot of cars and finish P9. I think one more lap and I would have been in the points. It's good to know that if I had of started P3 we could have won the race comfortably but at the same time it's frustrating to have dropped points. We are definitely in good shape for Bahrain though."

Meanwhile, Rapax's Stefano Coletti secured the race win closely followed by Jolyon's Carlin team-mate Felipe Nasr and Arden's Mitch Evans.

Jolyon is next in action on 19-21 April for rounds three and four in Bahrain. Full coverage, including live timing, will be available on his official website.

GP2 Malaysia, Sprint Race results:

1. S Coletti, Rapax, 22 laps
2. F Nasr, Carlin, +0.8s
3. M Evans, Arden, +8.3s
4. S Richelmi, Dams, +11.9s
5. J Cecotto, Arden, +15.8s
6. S Trummer, Rapax, +17.0s
7. C Daly, Hilmer, +17.4s
8. R Binder, Lazarus, +23.7s
9. J Palmer, Carlin, +24.3s
10. K Giovesi, Lazarus, +29.0s