KEY POINTS:
New Zealander Jonny Reid has won this morning's A1GP sprint race in Mexico.
The Black Beauty driver, who qualified second at the demanding Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez circuit, was followed to the podium by Great Britain's Oliver Jarvis and Swiss driver Neel Jani.
New Zealand is now back into second place in the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport behind championship leaders Switzerland.
"it has been a very difficult couple of rounds, especially in Durban" said Reid after the race, "but that's motor racing and it's really good to bounce back here with a win and survive the carnage at the first start.
"Our focus is on the championship lead and we will do everything we can from P6 in the feature race.
"It's ideally not where we deserve to start after the yellow flag in the last run in qualifying but there are a few drivers in the same boat. You can still win the race from there that's for sure."
The drama-packed sprint race saw some serious crashes, with a massive crash as the flag dropped seeing the red flag come out shortly after the rolling start.
The incident was caused by the two rows of the grid, after Adrian Zaugg accelerated the lifted off and accelerated again. This sent Ireland's Adam Carroll dart out to avoid the mess, and British driver Oliver Jarvis hit the rear of Swiss championship leader Neel Jani.
Pakistani Adam Khan's car was then sent airborne as he hit the rear of Germany's Michael Ammermuller, and Brazil's Bruno Junqueira left the track trying to avoid the carnage. Australian John Martin then hit the German, leaving Ammermuller the only driver unable to repair damage in time for the restart.
On the restart, South African pole-sitter Adrian Zaugg took the lead.
Later in the first lap Australia's John Martin was again in the thick of it, hitting Pakistan at the difficult new chicane. On form Jimmy Auby from Lebanon was also caught up in the crash.
It took Reid until lap three to put a pass on Zaugg, driving around the outside on turn one to take the lead and control of the race.
Two laps later the safety car was on the track after Czech driver Filip Salaquarda spun.
This gave the field a chance to bunch up, and when race pace resumed Reid did well to keep his position as Jani fought to take Oliver Jarvis' second place.
The Briton managed to keep his place until the race hit its time limit at lap 13, when Reid took the chequered flag.
Black Beauty will start the feature race from sixth place with Switzerland and Canada on the front row. France only qualified 14th for the race.
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