Yvan Muller wins Imola race two

The reigning champion had only scored four points in the last four races before finishing second to SEAT team-mate and championship leader Gabriele Tarquini in Sunday's first race. But he turned the tables on the Italian in race two, leading home the SEAT 1-2 this afternoon.

Muller made light work of getting into the lead from seventh on the grid, using turbo diesel power to blast by the BMWs of Alex Zanardi and Sergio Hernandez on the second lap before taking the lead from Alain Menu in the same fashion just a lap later.

Tarquini mirrored Muller's progress after unceremoniously shoving Rob Huff's Chevrolet out of the way at the second Rivazza on the opening lap.

The SEAT drivers did at least look like they would contest the victory, rather than settling into team formation. But the only opportunity that Tarquini had to displace his team-mate was wasted when he banged into the back of Muller under braking for Tamburello. He seemed to think better of attempting a repeat thereafter.

There was plenty more action involving the other SEATs, though. Jordi Gene attempted to wrestle sixth place away from Sergio Hernandez at Tamburello but didn't get far enough alongside the BMW and only succeeded in tapping his fellow Spaniard into a spin.

Tiago Monteiro then had a frightening moment when he clipped the back of Tom Boardman's SEAT on the way down to Rivazza, bounced over the grass on the inside of the corner and shot back across the track, just missing the front of Boardman on the way.

The likes of Rickard Rydell, Augusto Farfus and Andy Priaulx could only hope for the thin end of the points, starting from the back following their woes in the day's earlier race. Rydell made it up to seventh and Farfus eighth, while Priaulx just missed out in ninth.

Pos  Driver             Team          Time/Gap
 1.  Yvan Muller        SEAT        21m51.680s
 2.  Gabriele Tarquini  SEAT          + 0.312s
 3.  Alain Menu         Chevrolet     + 4.008s
 4.  Alex Zanardi       BMW           + 4.467s
 5.  Jordi Gene         SEAT          + 5.632s
 6.  James Thompson     Lada          + 7.190s
 7.  Rickard Rydell     SEAT          + 7.612s
 8.  Augusto Farfus     BMW           + 8.327s
 9.  Andy Priaulx       BMW           + 8.827s
10.  Stefano D'Aste     BMW           + 9.499s
11.  Sergio Hernandez   BMW          + 12.380s
12.  Felix Porteiro     BMW          + 12.902s
13.  Franz Engstler     BMW          + 13.390s
14.  Tom Coronel        SEAT         + 13.933s
15.  Jorg Muller        BMW          + 14.351s
16.  Nicola Larini      Chevrolet    + 15.582s
17.  Rob Huff           Chevrolet    + 19.759s
18.  Tom Boardman       SEAT         + 30.537s
19.  Kristian Poulsen   BMW          + 32.926s
20.  Kirill Ladygin     Lada         + 37.197s
21.  Andrea Larini      SEAT         + 37.198s
22.  Fabio Fabiani      BMW        + 1m24.989s
23.  Tiago Monteiro     SEAT          + 3 laps

Retirements:

     Mehdi Bennani      SEAT       6 laps