Davies doubles up at Snetterton.

Less than a fortnight after his maiden Formula three win, Britain's Matt Davies was at it again, taking line honours in the opening British Championship clash at Snetterton.

The Essex driver converted pole position into a first corner lead in the opening race of the weekend, but was immediately under pressure from the Carlin Motorsport Dallara of Japanese star Takuma Sato. Despite the constant attention of the pre-season favourite, however, the Avanti driver managed to hold firm, and was still in front when the race was neutralised half way through to allow marshals to retrieve wreckage from the circuit.

With the field forced to bunch up, Sato got a run on Davies and squeezed alongside into the first couple of corners after the green flag was shown. His assault was short-lived, however, as the gearbox on his car failed, handing the advantage back to round one winner Davies.

"I was lucky to finish the race at all," explained a relieved Davies afterwards, "My starter motor broke on the grid and, in my hurry to bump start my car, I shattered the reverse cog. There were bits of metal floating around in the gearbox and I was starting to have trouble with the downshift towards the end of the race."

With Sato dropping out, double Silverstone podium visitor Derek Hayes inherited second place with half the race to run. Davis' problems allowed the Irishman to close in over the latter stages, but there simply wasn't enough time for Hayes to capitalise fully.

The Avanti driver's nemesis from race two at Silverstone, Gianmaria Bruni moved up to third spot, adding to the second place he scored two weeks previously, with Scottish F3 rookie Ryan Dalziel banishing the memory of a poor first outing in the class to take fourth.

The former FRenault star's Prost Jr team-mate Nicolas Kiesa followed him home in fifth, ahead of opening race winner James Courtney and the second Jaguar F3 car of Andre Lotterer. Sato's team-mate Anthony Davidson was eighth, ahead of series returnee Milos Pavlovic and Manor Motorsport's Mark Taylor.

Dutchman Robert Doornbos took race one honours in the Scholarship class, after rivals Robbie Kerr and Michael Keohane were eliminated in an early clash which put Doornbos' Goddard team-mate Kerr out of the race and Keohane in the pits with a smashed nosecone.

The Dutchman than made his escape as a battle raged behind him between the two Performance Racing Dallaras of Silverstone winner Matthew Gilmore and team-mate Justin Sherwood.

Stuart King recovered from stalling on the green flag lap to take fourth and Indian Parthiva Sureshwaren took fifth after he ran as high as third early on. The top six was completed by Adam Blair who later admitted that he had been praying for rain which never came.