WTCC Macau 2013 Sees Yvan Muller dominates opening race

Motorsports

Published on November 17th, 2013 | by Daniel Sherman Fernandez

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WTCC Macau 2013 Sees Yvan Muller dominates opening race

WTCC Start_Race1_Aut12

Yvan Muller ensured a victorious end to his RML career with a dominant display in the World Touring Car Championship’s Macau opener. The Frenchman, who has won three of his four world crowns with the crack outfit, protected his lead away from the rolling start, won the race down to Lisboa and then simply disappeared.

Honda’s Tiago Monteiro held off race-long pressure from five-time Macau winner Rob Huff to clinch second, finishing just three tenths ahead of the Briton.

Contact between Pepe Oriola and Tom Chilton meanwhile sent the Briton into the wall on lap two, all but ending his hopes of finishing runner-up in the championship. Gabriele Tarquini, who remains second, did not compete after being forced to change his Honda’s engine following the morning warm-up. The Italian’s absence played a part in Muller’s victory: without Tarquini to contend with, he had only to hold off Monteiro on the run down to Lisboa to essentially seal the win. A mighty second sector helped him establish a 1.7-second lead after the opening lap, and he was able to extend that at will before backing off in the closing stages.

Norbert Michelisz moved into fourth away from the line, and held off early pressure from Bamboo duo Alex MacDowall and James Nash to keep the position to the finish. Nash had jumped Chilton at the start, and has likewise moved ahead of him in the championship – the former team-mates currently separated by just one point heading into the final race. They are both due to start from the second row.

2013  EVENT:  wtcc race of United States of America    TRACK:  Sonoma Raceway     TEAM:  Castrol Honda World Touring Car Team  CAR:  Honda Civic wtcc DRIVER:  Tiago Monteiro

After hitting Chilton – the incident is currently under investigation – Oriola had a massive moment in the Solitude Esses and dropped back into the clutches of Marc Basseng and Stefano D’Aste. Basseng’s pressure eventually told when he snuck through and into seventh one lap from the finish, with Oriola resisting D’Aste, Tom Boardman and Tom Coronel at the line. Just 1.5 seconds covered the quartet at the flag. Campos pair Hugo Valente and Konstantins Calko crashed of their own accord, while race two front-row man James Thompson suffered turbo issues and twice pitted.

Results – 9 laps:

Pos  Driver               Team/Car                  Time/Gap

1.  Yvan Muller          RML Chevrolet           22m54.522s

2.  Tiago Monteiro       Honda                      +1.265s

3.  Rob Huff             Munnich SEAT               +1.592s

4.  Norbert Michelisz    Zengo Honda                +5.147s

5.  Alex MacDowall       Bamboo Chevrolet           +7.096s

6.  James Nash           Bamboo Chevrolet           +7.632s

7.  Marc Basseng         Munnich SEAT              +18.148s

8.  Pepe Oriola          Tuenti Chevrolet          +20.345s

9.  Stefano D’Aste       PB BMW                    +20.644s

10.  Tom Boardman         Special Tuning SEAT       +21.213s

11.  Tom Coronel          ROAL BMW                  +21.806s

12.  Mehdi Bennani        Proteam BMW               +22.806s

13.  Darryl O’Young       ROAL BMW                  +30.471s

14.  Franz Engstler       Engstler BMW              +32.905s

15.  Mikhail Kozlovskiy   Lada                      +40.394s

16.  Rene Munnich         Munnich SEAT              +58.083s

17.  Yukinori Taniguchi   Nika Chevrolet          +1m12.888s

18.  Michael Soong        Campos SEAT             +1m13.961s

19.  Henry Ho             Engstler BMW            +1m16.085s

20.  Filipe de Souza      China Dragon Chevrolet  +1m18.107s

21.  Joseph Rosa-Merszei  Engstler BMW            +1m36.668s

22.  Ng Kin Veng          China Dragon Chevrolet  +1m44.616s

23.  Celio Alves Dias     China Dragon Chevrolet  +1m45.773s

24.  Eurico de Jesus      PAS Honda               +1m46.315s

25.  Jeronimo Badaraco    Son Veng Chevrolet      +1m55.988s

26.  Lam Kam San          China Dragon Chevrolet  +2m23.146s

27.  Mak Ka Lok           RPM BMW                 +2m25.450s


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