Action start and finish at Hungary.

Tomas Enge took the lead of the FIA F3000 Championship with victory in a Hungaroring race that was run-of-the-mill except for the first and last five laps.

At the start the 22 protagonists up and down the grid were quickly aware that their only chance to make places was going to be into the first corner and on the first lap whilst everyone found their grip levels.

Whilst pole-man Tomas Enge got off to a storming start, those behind him scrabbled for position and there was more than a couple of cases of carbon fibre contact. Only one car was forced off track however, that of Mario Haberfeld who took to the grass after some contact midfield as the pack neared the first corner.

As Enge sped off in to the distance, the Coloni drivers Enrico Toccacello and Giorgio Pantano fought tooth and nail for the second place. Toccacello had qualified ahead of his team-mate and Pantano, for the initial laps at least, made it clear he regarded that place as his. Ultimately Pantano recognised the futility of the fight at the difficult to pass Hungaroring and backed off to some two seconds behind his team-mate for the majority of the race.

Poor qualifying championship leader Sebastien Bourdais managed to make two places in the start, but ultimately sat in fourth with no action, save for the final laps. As the race settled down the battle of the race quickly emerged to be that of Patrick Friesacher and Tiago Monteiro for ninth place. Monteiro was far faster in the corners, but was unable to put this to use on the straights. As the pair battled so Monteiro's tactics became more desperate. More often than not there'd be a locked brake going into corners, and when Monteiro tried to pass around the outside of turn one it looked like a recipe for disaster. Ultimately he stayed on track, though without gaining the position.

Monteiro's persistence was not rewarded by the desired ninth place, but by a visit to the pits after his nose cone was damaged as he stuck it in the danger zone of Friesacher's car.

Elsewhere the race was mainly a procession, as befits the Hungarian circuit. Enge stretched out almost a five second gap at the front and all looked to be settled to the chequered flag. Some action did look to be on the cards from Haberfeld, Pizzonia and Ricardo Sperafico.

Haberfeld was clearly having braking problems and his presence entering a corner was marked by plumes of smoke from a locked wheel. One such time however, Pizzonia whether caught out by Haberfeld's braking, or making a mistake of his own, pitched his Petrobras car sideways into the back of Haberfeld's car. This pitched Haberfeld in to a series of barrel rolls in the air.

Back on the ground, thankfully right way up and after no driver contact with the hard stuff. Haberfeld removed himself from his car and was met by Pizzonia who had extracted himself from his. Pizzonia seemed keen to talk, Haberfeld was not interested and pushed the Petrobras Jr. driver away. Whilst this was going on marshals moved to tend to their cars under waved yellows.

Despite the waved yellows the pack soon arrived on the scene at a barely reduced speed and a nasty accident was narrowly avoided as the marshals jumped out of the way and cars flew in all directions.

The safety car them came out and those left intact followed it around until what was thought to be the end of the race, until the yellow lights on the car were switched off to indicate there would be a single lap sprint to the chequered flag. As there was still a fair amount of debris on the track and an incident had so narrowly been avoided, this raised more than a few eyebrows.

Thankfully the last lap sprint passed without incident and Tomas Enge took the win and showed his happiness with some sideways exurberance on in coming in lap.

The Coloni pairing of Toccacelo and Pantano came home second and third, ahead of Bourdais, who has now lost his championship lead to Enge.