Yvan Muller delighted after perfect weekend at Monza

Pole position and two race victories sees the more relaxed three-times champion leave Monza with a 23 point lead over his nearest rival after the first meeting of the 2013 WTCC season at Monza.

The Frenchman smashed the qualifying lap record on Saturday and topped every session bar the wet Sunday morning warm-up, winning the first race despite a broken windscreen wiper and taking the win in race two after starting from ninth on the grid.

Despite finalising the deal only earlier this month, with LUKOIL adding it’s support to Muller, and just a short test at Snetterton a few days later, Yvan Muller and the Chevrolet Cruze were still the class of the field at the Italian track, despite carrying 40kg compensation ballast.

“I’m especially pleased because we spent so much energy since last year in June when Chevrolet decided to pull out,” he said. “We’ve worked hard since then to put this programme together, and that was finished just one month ago.”

The wet conditions on race day was the first time rain has hit a WTCC event since the Hungaroring in 2011, and Muller admitted he found the conditions very difficult.
“It was impossible to see even the lights on the cars,” he explained. “It was very tricky to brake at the right point; at one straight I braked maybe 500 metres before the corner because I didn’t know where I was, but that was probably the case for everyone.”

“I was very focussed to not take risks, I was not looking for the victory, I was just looking for the top five and I didn’t make any mistakes that’s why I could overtake some cars as I just used the opportunity of the cars making mistakes in front of me.”

Yvan Muller now leads the drivers’ standings on 55 points with team-mate Tom Chilton in second place on 32. A strong weekend for Gabriele Tarquini in his first WTCC race with Honda sees the Italian third in the standings on 28.

In the manufacturers’ championship, with Chevrolet, BMW and SEAT not paying the entry fee this year the only brands represented are Honda and Lada. Honda therefore have a commanding lead on 94 points, with Lada’s James Thompson and Aleksei Dudukalo picking up six points in qualifying before the team was forced to withdraw with two damaged cars ahead of the next meeting.