Photo: WTCC Media

Yvan Muller seals race one victory in Hungary

By

Yvan Muller led the way unchallenged in the first race at the Hungaroring, whilst all eyes were on the sensational recovery drives of BMW drivers Norbert Michelisz and Tom Coronel.

At the start, Gabriele Tarquini’s SEAT had a good run around the outside into Turn 1 with Darryl O’Young in tow in the STR SEAT, whilst Norbert Michelisz had got ahead of the Chevrolet of Alain Menu in the middle of the track, but a slight tap behind as the field bundled into the first corner unsettled the Zengõ Motorsport BMW, which slid into Darryl O’Young, who sustained damage and pitted, with Michelisz dropping outside of the top ten.

Meanwhile Tarquini made contact with Rob Huff’s Chevrolet up front, with the SEAT bouncing out over the Chevrolet at the first corner. Tarquini slowly recovered to the pits to retire from the race.

Whilst the Chevrolets were relatively safe up front, although Rob Huff was challenged briefly by Alain Menu on lap six, Michelisz was the one grabbing all the attention working his way through the order, breaking back into the top ten on lap three passing James Nash’s Arena Ford & Alex MacDowall’s Bamboo Chevrolet to move into seventh, and then closed in on the SUNRED SEAT León WTCC of Pepe Oriola over the next few laps.

Tom Coronel, who had started 21st in the ROAL Motorsport BMW, was also making good progress, and was up to 11th on lap five. The Dutchman also passed British pair Nash & MacDowall and closed in on the battle behind fifth placed Tiago Monteiro’s SUNRED León.

On the penultimate lap, Michelisz dived down the inside of Oriola for sixth, with Tom Coronel following through further around the lap. On the final lap, Michelisz was sizing up Monteiro for a pass but was caught out by Coronel, who passed the Hungarian to steal sixth place.

Mehdi Bennani finished in fourth for Proteam Racing, relatively unnoticed behind the Chevrolets and four seconds clear of Monteiro’s SR León.

Gábor Wéber made it two Hungarians in the top ten, whilst key retirements were the two STR SEATs, with Tom Boardman’s SEAT León TDI stranded at Turn 1 throughout the race and James Thompson’s Lada, which retired soon after a close battle with Charles Ng’s Engstler Motorsport BMW, which had started from the back after a late engine change.

The second race takes place at 14:35 CET.