Rodolfo Gonzalez suffered a painful return to Trident Racing in the opening round of the GP2 Asia series after the Attleborough racer hurt his back after a first lap collision.

After a three-car accident left the start line blocked at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi, the race was red flagged to a halt but in the confusion, he ended up flying over the rear wheels of the car in front.

'At the first lap I was right behind Charles Pic, and as I was so close to him, I didn't see the safety car sign,' explained Gonzales. 'When he slowed down, I literally took off over his rear wheels and landed with a big hit, hurting my back.'

Gonzalez dragged his broken car back to the pits where his mechanics set about effecting repairs as the track was being cleared of the damaged cars.

'Back at the pits, the team did all the repairs that were possible, but I raced with several broken components. I fought hard in order to get to the end, and I am happy for having accomplished that goal.'

His race performance was quite phenomenal. He had to start from 23rd on the grid after he felt he had 'a general lack of grip and something wrong with the rear suspension' during qualifying.

Despite the pain, Gonzalez made up more places than anyone else on his way to finishing in 11th place.

After the race Gonzalez reported back pains, and was checked at the track's medical centre and later cleared to race on the following day, in which he claimed ninth place.

'I did a good start, and in the first part of the race the car's handling was quite right. From then on I started to suffer huge rear tyre wear and I needed to slow down my pace.'

Having narrowly missed out on a podium place on his return to sports car racing at the recent Daytona 24 hours, Martin Brundle will be teaming up with son Alex in the Radical Nevada Cup. The King's Lynn pair will be sharing one of the Peterborough-built SR8 RX's for the two 45-minute races at the Ascari Race Resort in Spain.

Uggeshall's Tom Ashton starts as a strong favourite to lift the Radical UK Cup crown this year after confirming he will be teaming up with former Club Cup race winner Jonathan Wright.