Photo: WTCC Media

Alain Menu closes in with race one victory

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Alain Menu has closed the points gap to championship leader Rob Huff with a comfortable win in Round 11 of the World Touring Car Championship in Portugal.

The Swiss-driver got away well at the rolling start, whilst it was Rob Huff who looked briefly under threat starting in third, as the SUNRED of Gabriele Tarquini made light contact with the Briton’s Chevrolet Cruze’s rear quarter.

The incident only saw the Italian lose pace, and Tiago Monteiro managed to dive down the inside of his SUNRED team-mate to take fourth position to the cheers of his home crowd.

The first two casualties of the race were the two Leóns of Fredy Barth and Aleksei Dudukalo. Barth appeared to be spun around by Javier Villa’s Proteam Racing BMW 320, and then he was collected by his Russian team-mate.

Villa was under investigation for the incident when he crashed out whilst chasing Kristian Poulsen’s BMW for 11th. The Spanish-driver lost control going around the chicane at Turn 7 and remained on the track for the remainder of the race with yellow flags guarding his position.

Michel Nykjaer made good progress in the Yokohama Independents’ Trophy to pass the Wiechers-Sport BMW of Stefano D’Aste to finish second in class, whilst Norbert Michelisz maintained his eighth place position throughout the race to take the independents’ class victory.

Up front Menu had it all under control, whilst Muller was harried all race by Huff. In the end, the Briton couldn’t find away past and the top three finished as they started, with Alain Menu taking his third win of the year.

Menu closes to within 43 points of Rob Huff with the win, with Yvan Muller also closing by three points to 22 away from the championship leader.

Kristian Poulsen stretches his lead in the Yokohama Independents’ Trophy to eight points from Javier Villa, whilst Michelisz is now just one point behind Villa in third.

Stefano D’Aste picked up the first points for Wiechers-Sport in both the overall championship and the independents’ trophy with tenth place.

The second race of the day takes place at 16:50 BST/WEST.