Tiago Monteiro wins at home race

Tiago Monteiro drove a faultless race from start to finish. He defended his second place from the start line holding onto second, then on the second lap, the local hero passed Porteiro to take the first position. He then continued to drive the perfect race slowly driving away from the chasing pack. The Estoril crowd were ecstatic at Monteiro’s win.

Priaulx had a great start getting as high as third. He was passed my Muller but then applied pressure for the rest of the race constantly sat at Muller’s bumper. Priaulx tried everything to get past, at one point putting two wheels off road to get a better run onto the back of Muller.

Yvan Muller drove a solid race constantly defending Priaulx despite the disadvantage at various stages on the track of the front wheel drive SEAT Leon TDI.

Porteiro intially drove well, but later in the race succumbed to the pressure of Muller and Priaulx losing his second position and dropping to 4th. This promoted Muller to second and Priaulx to third and last podium spot. Muller’s second place meant a SEAT 1-2 finish for the second race in Portugal.

Rob Huff made an aggressive start trying to take positions by running on the outside however his tactic did not work out as well as he’d hoped, eventually finishing in fifth position closely followed by team mate Larini.

Further down the field on lap 10 Farfus made a pass on Tarquini after Tarquini struggled with success ballast, giving Farfus 10th place and dropping Tarquini to the 11th.