Jiang Tengyi wins ahead of Darryl O’Young in Guangdong

Jiang Tengyi won the first round of the 2014 China Touring Car Championship at the Guangdong International Circuit this weekend in his first weekend with the Shanghai VW 333 Racing Team, after switching from Ford during the off-season.

Yeung Cheuk Lun of Wan Shan Racing and Li Kwan Lung of HKR, who both missed the qualifying session, were permitted by the officials to take part in the race, thus making the grid of 15 cars.

The two Citroën C-Elysées of Team Work Motorsport however were both forced to miss the race due to an insufficient amount of spares.

When the race began, Changan Ford FRD Team’s Andy Yan led during the first two-thirds of the race, although he was briefly passed by his Ford team-mate Rainey He on the opening lap, with the other two Fords of Martin Xie and Darryl O’Young following in third and fourth positions.

The fight from Shanghai VW 333 Racing started to appear from the third lap, with Jiang Tengyi and Zhang Zhen Dong passing Rainey He’s Ford on lap four. Jiang then tried to get ahead of O’Young’s Ford Focus on lap 11, but O’Young was able to break away from Jiang, moving ahead of team-mate Rainey He for second.

Race leader Andy Yan headed into the pits on lap 16, promoting O’Young to the lead of the race, albeit briefly, as he was then passed by Jiang’s VS Polo on the same lap, with Jiang going on to lead for the rest of the race, taking the first win of the season for Volkswagen in the Polo GTI 1.6T.

Darryl O’Young took the best result for the Ford team for the first race of the season with second, less than a second behind Jiang, with Martie Xie completing the podium.

Filipe de Souza was the best placed of the Team MIRR Chevrolets, finishing in seventh, 30 seconds behind the race leader,

The second round of CTCC will be held on May 11th at the Zhuhai International Circuit.