The Observer

"The difficulties are still the same," said Alex Zanardi last weekend in answer to the question how his first win of 2006 compared to his breakthrough World Touring Car victory last year. "It's not like my legs have grown back!"

It was one of half a dozen golden quotes from a true living legend. Zanardi was always a special man and a very fine racing driver. But since September 2001, when he lost his legs in a horrifying Champ Car accident, he has transcended any levels of human spirit that could be described as normal.

To rebuild his life on artificial limbs, to refuse to give up on the sport he knew and loved, to remain the funny, charming, decent guy he had always been - he's just an inspiration.

His victory at Istanbul Park on Sunday in the latest round of the WTCC was the high point of a fascinating weekend. This was the first time I had been called upon to report on a round of the series and I had been looking forward to it. Zanardi's win in race one helped the experience live up to expectations.

OK, so the Super 2000 tin-tops have nothing on DTM cars, Aussie V8 Supercars or even Super Tourers from 10 years ago. But the mix of manufacturers - BMW, SEAT, Chevrolet and Alfa Romeo - the stellar grid of ace drivers, the short but intensely entertaining format of two 30-mile races lead me to one simple conclusion. The WTCC works.

But it is far from perfect. The first thing that struck me about the weekend in Turkey was how low-key the meeting was. Now I understand this was a particular case, that most of the other rounds have much more hustle and bustle. But in Istanbul this was a very good show that was being undersold.

The Istanbul paddock © XPB/LAT

The WTCC is a series built for TV, with Eurosport's coverage the lifeblood of its very existence. But still, TV pictures of empty grandstands do little for the profile of the series - and there were a lot of empty grandstands at Istanbul Park.

It doesn't help that this very fine new venue is built for Formula One and is therefore on a grand scale. A decent crowd of 50,000 still wouldn't make the place look packed. But there were probably more people in the paddock on Sunday than there were in the stands.

No one in the sprawling, congested, yet exotically beautiful city seemed to have a clue what the WTCC was, or that it was visiting. The lack of promotion, combined with an unfortunate clash with the beginning of Ramadan, did not give this the air of a World Championship-level race meeting.

I asked the general manager of the circuit, Baran Asena if the religious festival would have affected the size of the crowd, and he said yes, the timing was very unfortunate. But he added that there were other factors.

"The podium ceremony controversy at the Grand Prix last month brought hesitation into the minds of the teams and the series organisation because there was doubt over the race taking place," he said. "And the rain on Saturday did not help. It kills the atmosphere."

Ah yes, the rain. I spoke to Mr Asena on Sunday morning when we looked set for decent, if not particularly sunny, weather. We had no idea of the deluge that would hit the track following Zanardi's win in the dry first race.

As the cars left the pitlane to form the grid for the second race, the sky turned black and the mother of all storms hit the place. I scurried back to the shelter of the press room, wondering what effect this would have on the rest of the day.

The answer looked likely to be disappointing. The water levels at the lowest corners of this undulating track were rising - fast. The TV pictures showed the marshals at Turn 9 vainly attempting to thwart the growing lake that was drowning the circuit. They soon gave up.

The dirty brown water rose to the top of the tyre walls, and over one of them. A fire truck sat behind the catch fencing was stranded, the flood having risen almost to its wheel arches.

Andy Priaulx (BMW) is caught up in a first turn incident © XPB/LAT

No way are we going to get a second race, I thought. The rain had stopped but surely it would not drain away in time. I walked back down to the pitlane to see what the mood was like among the teams and drivers.

I wasn't surprised to find that there were a lot of annoyed people down there. It wasn't the rain that had wound them up, it was the antics witnessed in the first race.

The day before, I'd been telling Ray Mallock, who runs Chevrolet's team, how much I admired the driving standards in the WTCC. Compared to the banger racing that had become the norm in the British Touring Car Championship, the WTCC was whiter than white. There seemed to be more respect between the drivers, I'd said, adding that I thought this a purer form of touring car racing.

Now I was wishing that I'd kept my mouth shut. There had been more banging and bashing in race one than you'd witness on a summer afternoon at the Smallfield grass track up the road from where I live.

Yards of duct tape had been used up by every team; Jordi Gene was furious, having been punted numerously by a couple of Alfa Romeos, Yvan Muller was feeling victimised after being assaulted by three marauding BMWs, and points leader Andy Priaulx was slumped on a garage floor, looking totally disenchanted with life after being rammed off by Independent runner Luca Rangoni - who also drives a BMW, incidentally!

"Did you see what happened?" he said incredulously. "He fired me off. I can't believe it. You wouldn't believe how hard he hit me. I've got one word for him: tosser." Oh dear.

There's no excuse for dirty driving, but I guess I shouldn't have been surprised at the explosion of professional fouls in Turkey. The manufacturers' and drivers' titles are both still wide open with just two rounds left after this one. The tension is building and it's at times like this where usual good sense can be lost in a fog of red mist. Still, a few people let themselves and the championship down badly on Sunday.

But back to the flood. Incredibly, word began filtering through that the water was draining away. There was likely to be a second race after all. Having gawped and guffawed at the TV pictures in the press room, I couldn't believe it. Fair play to Hermann Tilke - he obviously designs pretty good drainage systems at his race tracks.

The second race finally started a full two hours after it had been scheduled to. But it was worth waiting for. Run on a still very wet track, it was a true classic, in contrast to the first race fully deserving of its World Championship status.

Gabriele Tarquini passes SEAT teammate Peter Terting at the line © XPB/LAT

But it ended on what was for me a bit of a sour note. Team orders are banned by the FIA, but they have always been a part of motor racing and the drivers understand that. With championships all to play for, they know when they have to lift off to let teammates through - and they don't necessarily need a direct order from the team over the radio to do it.

It had happened in the first race when Duncan Huisman let Dirk Muller through for fourth place on the last lap. But this time it happened right at the front.

Peter Terting, who'd driven tremendously after a very difficult weekend, led SEAT teammate Gabriele Tarquini on the final lap - and he looked far enough ahead to make it home first.

But on the back straight, Tarquini breezed past him, negotiated the final turns, then punched the air in celebration as he took the flag.

OK, it was his first win of 2006 and now he was only one point off Priaulx's championship lead, but this was no glorious moment, surely. Terting had lifted off.

The subject was skirted around in the official press conference, before which various SEAT employees had whispered in Terting's ear what looked like instructions on what to say, and what not to say.

To be fair to Tarquini, he didn't avoid the subject. "I have to say thank you to Peter. He was a little bit easy with me. With more of a battle he could have been in first position."

After the press conference, I approached Terting, but not before an Italian journalist had got there before me. "It looked a little bit like Schumacher and Barrichello in Austria 2002," he said to the driver.

"No, I didn't slow down," said Terting in a defensive tone. "I had a problem with the gearbox, shifting up. He's my teammate, I couldn't stop him."

Now, Terting had complained of gearbox problems earlier in the weekend and had admitted that in the circumstances he didn't believe he should fight with a teammate. But the doubts still remain that this was as blatant as the massaging of the result in Austria four years ago.

With so much to play for, it's totally understandable that teams and drivers should do this. But it is still cynical and it has no place in sport, as far as I'm concerned. What's the point of winning when it's been handed to you?

Anyway, the incident disappointed me, but it only added to what had been an intriguing and entertaining weekend. The rest of the season will be thrilling.

Andy Priaulx © XPB/LAT

But for Priaulx there is a strong element of disenchantment at the moment. He was fired off in the second race too, and left Turkey without scoring a point. But this is not why he is deflated.

Before even first practice, Priaulx knew he was up against it because of the excessive success ballast he had been laden with. His BMW carried the maximum of 80 kilos, his reward for winning four races this year. Last year, he only won once during his clever, tactical journey to the title.

Priaulx feels on top of his game at the moment and feels he should be free to rack up victory after victory. But with these rules, he can't do that.

"This circuit has a lot of downhill braking and uphill accelerating which is the worst combination with this much weight," he said on Saturday. "And I don't think the tyre can take 80 kilos."

Last year he won the title in Macau despite a heavy weight penalty. But he's not confident that faced with the same scenario this time he'd be able to produce the same result.

The weight rules do essentially rule out top drivers from whole race meetings, which makes little sense in either sporting or promotional terms. But thankfully this is something that the WTCC organisers have recognised. The rules will change for next year.

But that doesn't help Priaulx right now. He's up against it - and there's nothing much he can do about it.