Jolyon Palmer extended his GP2 championship lead in front of his home fans at Silverstone today (Saturday), with second place, his sixth podium of the season. He has now scored 135 points this season, 45 more than nearest challenger Felipe Nasr.

Jolyon started from second position on the prime tyres, and was able to hold his position into the first corner, despite having to start from the damp side of the grid, following showers earlier in the day. He lost track position to Mitch Evans into the second corner, but quickly got back on line to maintain third. Felipe Nasr launched an attack on Jolyon in the latter half of the lap; however Jolyon was able to stay ahead with some late braking into Stowe and a staunch defence into Club.

Fastest times in the opening two sectors of the lap allowed Jolyon to draw clear of Nasr and apply pressure on Evans ahead, setting a 1m45.079s fastest lap in the process. By the end of the following lap Jolyon was only three tenths behind the Kiwi, before pulling off an opportunist move to reclaim second into The Loop at the start of lap 4.

A string of fastest laps then allowed Jolyon to close down the gap to the leading Raffaele Marciello, with lap times of 1m44.720s on lap 7 and 1m44.468s bringing the gap down to just 0.7s on lap 9. Marciello pitted at the end of lap 10, freeing Jolyon to set the pace at the front. He was able to continue setting personal best times at the front,  with further fastest laps being set on the fourteenth and eighteenth laps.

Jolyon pitted from the lead at the end of lap 19, with the French DAMS squad acting quickly to change to the softer option tyres. At the end of the next lap Evans emerged from the pits just ahead, but Jolyon attacked immediately with late braking into Brooklands and then again with an attempt around the outside at the following corner.

Jolyon eventually finished less than five seconds behind Evans, more than 20 seconds up the road from the chasing pack.

Speaking about his result on the podium, Jolyon commented, "To be honest I'm gutted not to win, because I really thought that was in the bag. But I'm pleased, with DAMS we did a good job, maybe we should have won the race but in the end I'm happy with second."

The GP2 Silverstone Sprint Race takes place at 09.20 UK time on Sunday.

GP2, Silverstone Feature Race
1, M Evans, Russian Time, 29 laps
2, J Palmer, DAMS, +4.9s
3, S Vandoorne, ART Grand Prix, +25.6
4, J Leal, Carlin, +31.9s
5, S Coletti, Racing Engineering, +32.0s
6, J Cecotto, Trident Racing, +32.2s
7, F Nasr, Carlin, +32.9s
8, S Richelmi, DAMS, +34.8s
9, M Sorensen, MP Motorsport, +35.0s
10, D Abt, Hilmer Motorsport, +40.2s