Adam Carroll took two vital point-scoring finishes for Belmayne A1 Team Ireland in round three of the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport at the Sepang International Circuit.
But it was Team Switzerland who were triumphant, opening up a 10-point lead at the top of the standings, after Neel Jani claimed victory in both the sprint and feature races in Malaysia.
The Swiss driver, who was on pole for both races, dominated the Sprint race from the start, finishing 3.792 seconds ahead of France's Loic Duval, with Michael Ammermuller of Germany in third place.
Jani then gave Switzerland its first win in a Feature race, outpacing Brazilian rookie Sergio Jimenez to win by 8.414 seconds, with Duval in third place.
With Jani also setting fastest laps in both races, Switzerland picked up a maximum 32 points from the weekend to move to the top of the A1GP standings with 61 points.
Irishman Carroll made a good start in the sprint race and stayed out of trouble through turns one and two, and placed his car perfectly down the inside into turn three to pick up further places.
By the end of lap one he was up to eighth, but he eventually lost out to Team Netherlands and finished ninth.
The feature race started well, with Carroll getting away cleanly at the start and passing the Netherlands and Germany by the end of lap one to move up to fifth.
After an incident between South Africa and Canada brought out the safety car on lap nine, Carroll immediately pitted, but he lost time during the stop and emerged in seventh place.
Problems on the new tyres caused the back end to step out on lap 15, spinning the car 360 degrees.
Carroll did a great job to keep it on the track, but dropped to tenth.
After struggling during the middle stint he came in on lap 24 for his second scheduled pit stop.
With a quick and clean stop, and a great drive from Carroll in the final stint, Ireland recovered to seventh overall, taking four more vital championship points.
Carroll said after the race: 'I made a good start in the sprint race and kept out of trouble as a few cars ahead tripped over each other, and then I just pushed as hard as I could.
'It was a difficult race so it was good to get some points. The feature race was really tough, though.
'I lost the rear end of the car into turn five after the first pit stop but managed to recover.
'I was pushing really hard but we struggled in the second stint.
'The car felt good in the third stint, though, and I was putting in consistently quick times.
'After such a hard weekend it’s great to still come away with some points and we know where we need to improve for China.'
Dan Walmsley, Race Engineer said: 'The feature race was a mixed race for us really.
'It started quite promising but we didn’t have the best first pit stop and didn’t get the best out of the tyres in the second stint.
'Adam also had a spin so we had to change our strategy.
'During the final stint we were competitive and fast, and Adam put in a great drive to recover back to seventh.'
Mark Kershaw, Team Owner added:
'Considering some of the problems we had today, a double points finish is a good save.
'Scoring in the sprint race form 13th on the grid was as much as we could have hoped for, while in the feature the second set of tyres didn’t work well for us, so Adam did really well to recover.
'We now have plenty to build on and are looking forward to Zhuhai.'
Malaysia A1GP Results:
Sprint Race: 1 Switzerland (Jani) 18mins 20.910secs, 2 France (Duval) 18:24.702, 3 Germany (Ammermuller) 18:32.845, 4 Canada (Wickens) 18:34.037, 5 Brazil (Jimenez) 18:34.647, 6 New Zealand (Reid) 18:35.386, 7 Great Britain (Jarvis) 18:35.847, 8 Netherlands (Bleekemolen) 18:36.237, 9 Ireland (Carroll) 18:40.589, 10 Italy (Toccacelo) 18:44.131, 11 Malaysia (Yoong) 18:44.497, 12 South Africa (Zaugg) 18:46.015, 13 India (Karthikeyan) 18:46.114, 14 USA (Summerton) 18:47.437, 15 Portugal (Urbano) 18:48.682, 16 Lebanon (Alajajian) 18:55.031, 17 Czech Republic (Janis) 18:57.238, 18 Pakistan (Khan) 18:58.456, 19 Indonesia (Hermanto) 19:05.730, 20 Mexico (Jourdain Jr) 19:08.326, 21 China (Congfu) at 9 laps, 22 Australia (Dyk) at 10 laps
Feature Race: 1 Switzerland (Jani) 1hrs 08mins 13.459secs, 2 Brazil (Jimenez) 1:08:21.873, 3 France (Duval) 1:08:22.387, 4 Netherlands (Bleekemolen) 1:08:24.681, 5 China (Congfu) 1:08:30.813, 6 India (Karthikeyan) 1:08:31.053, 7 Ireland (Carroll) 1:08:32.831, 8 New Zealand (Reid) 1:08:33.856, 9 Australia (Dyk) 1:08:57.753, 10 Great Britain (Jarvis) 1:08:57.818, 11 USA (Summerton) 1:08:58.008, 12 Mexico (Jourdain Jr) 1:08:58.174, 13 Germany (Ammermuller) 1:08:59.868, 14 Malaysia (Yoong) 1:09:02.254, 15 Pakistan (Khan) 1:09:10.336, 16 Czech Republic (Janis) 1:09:11.778, 17 Indonesia (Hermanto) 1:09:34.365, 18 Lebanon (Alajajian) at 9 laps, 19 Italy (Toccacelo) at 18 laps, 20 South Africa (Zaugg) at 28 laps, 21 Canada (Wickens) at 28 laps, 22 Portugal (Urbano) at 35 laps
Leading Championship Standings after rd 4: 1 Switzerland 61pts, 2 France 51, 3 New Zealand 45, 4 Netherlands 42, 5 Great Britain 36, 5 South Africa 36, 7 Ireland 29, 8 Germany 24, 9 Brazil 22, 10 Mexico 17, 11 China 16, 12 Canada 8, 12 India 8, 14 Australia 2, 14 Italy 2, 14 Portugal 2, 17 Czech Republic 1, 18 Indonesia 0, 18 Lebanon 0, 18 Malaysia 0, 18 Pakistan 0, 18 USA 0
