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Monza WTCC: Yvan Muller charges to second Monza win in rain

Yvan Muller completed his perfect start to the 2013 World Touring Car Championship by coming through from 10th to win the second race at Monza

The Frenchman made a rapid start and was fourth by the end of the first lap.

Moves on Michel Nykjaer at Lesmo 2 and then on Marc Basseng around the outside of Curva Grande elevated him to second by the fourth lap, while a mistake by Gabriele Tarquini at Ascari earned him the lead heading into Parabolica one lap later.

Muller rapidly extended that to a comfortable two-second margin, allowing him to manage the gap for the rest of the race.

Nykjaer, Tarquini and Basseng remained locked in a race-long battle for the final two podium spots.

Nykjaer eventually managed to edge clear and claim second in the first event of his NIKA team's new programme.

Behind him a furious scrap between Tarquini and Basseng was finally settled in the Honda man's favour, the pair crossing the line separated by just 0.087 seconds.

As they quarelled Tom Chilton, who had fought his way up from ninth on the grid, closed in. The Briton, runner-up in race one, ran out of time and finished half a second down the road in fifth.

Pepe Oriola, who like Chilton had spent much of the race trying to find a way past James Nash, grabbed sixth.

Nash was seventh, but is under investigation from the stewards following his dogged defence.

Tiago Monteiro picked up his second top-10 finish in eighth, just ahead of Stefano D'Aste - who had crashed heavily in the opener - and Rob Huff.

The defending champion had elected to start from the pitlane in order to fix a braking issue on his Munnich SEAT, but still managed to pick his way through the field and round out the top 10.

Muller now leads the championship on 55 points, ahead of RML Chevrolet team-mate Chilton on 32.

Results - 10 laps:

Pos  Driver                 Team/Car                Time/Gap
 1.  Yvan Muller            RML Chevrolet         23m27.254s
 2.  Michel Nykjaer         NIKA Chevrolet          + 2.482s
 3.  Gabriele Tarquini      Honda                   + 4.994s
 4.  Marc Basseng           Munnich SEAT            + 5.081s
 5.  Tom Chilton            RML Chevrolet           + 5.612s
 6.  Pepe Oriola            Tuenti SEAT             + 6.755s
 7.  James Nash             Bamboo Chevrolet       + 14.445s
 8.  Tiago Monteiro         Honda                  + 20.573s
 9.  Stefano d'Aste         PB BMW                 + 23.722s
10.  Rob Huff               Munnich SEAT           + 25.442s
11.  Tom Coronel            ROAL BMW               + 37.126s
12.  Darryl O'Young         ROAL BMW               + 41.394s
13.  Franz Engstler         Engstler BMW           + 43.904s
14.  Fredy Barth            Wiechers BMW           + 45.921s
15.  Fernando Monje         Campos SEAT            + 50.678s
16.  Tom Boardman           Special Tuning SEAT    + 53.591s
17.  Charles Ng             Engstler BMW           + 59.157s
18.  Jean-Philippe Dayraut  Anome BMW            + 1m06.537s
19.  Mehdi Bennani          Proteam BMW          + 1m26.721s
20.  Alex MacDowall         Bamboo Chevrolet         + 1 lap
21.  Rene Munnich           Munnich SEAT             + 1 lap
22.  Norbert Michelisz      Zengo Honda              + 1 lap

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