Beijing Goldenport WTCC: Tom Chilton takes first victory of 2014

The Chevrolet driver's success is the first non-Citroen feature race win of the season, although fellow Cruze runner Gianni Morbidelli scored a reversed-grid victory at the Hungaroring in May.

Reigate driver Chilton executed a perfect start as third-qualifier Yvan Muller immediately jumped past front row man Gabriele Tarquini's JAS Honda.

Chilton was unfazed by the interruption of a lengthy safety-car period, and pulled away from his former team-mate Muller on the restart to extend a lead in excess of five seconds.

In the closing laps Chilton eased off to secure a comfortable 2.5s margin of victory over Citroen's title favourites Muller and Jose Maria Lopez.

It was a tough day for the factory JAS Hondas, which after displaying signs of a performance breakthrough on Saturday posted a double retirement.

Tarquini was forced to pit from second five laps from home, while team-mate Tiago Monteiro failed to progress beyond lap 14.

Former champion Tarquini's problems promoted points leader Lopez to the final step on the podium.

Morbidelli completed a strong but lonely run to take fourth, ahead of Sebastien Loeb, who dropped two places on lap 11 but battled up from seventh past Norbert Michelisz to finish fifth.

Chinese racer Ma Qing Hua was hot on Loeb's heels for a considerable portion of the race, before running through a gravel trap.

Moscow winner Ma's tumble down the order assisted a strong result from Lada's British pairing of James Thompson and Rob Huff who finished seventh and eighth.

The safety car was called on the second lap, when Munnich Motorsport's Rene Munnich and Dusan Borkovic tangled between Turns 10 and 11.

Munnich's car came to rest on the inside of the track, with the Campos machine of Borkovic facing in the wrong direction tight-in behind.

Heavy duty cranes removed the stricken cars, but the clear-up process took eight laps. The attrition elevated TC2 points leader Franz Engstler to 10th and the final point.

RESULTS - 28 LAPS:

Pos	Driver	Team	Car	Gap
1	Tom Chilton	ROAL Motorsport	Chevrolet	35m44.890s
2	Yvan Muller	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	2.493s
3	Jose Maria Lopez	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	5.132s
4	Gianni Morbidelli	All-Inkl.com Munnich Motorsport	Chevrolet	10.473s
5	Sebastien Loeb	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	14.455s
6	Norbert Michelisz	Zengo Motorsport	Honda	17.238s
7	James Thompson	LADA Sport Lukoil	Lada	18.338s
8	Rob Huff	LADA Sport Lukoil	Lada	19.104s
9	Mehdi Bennani	Proteam Racing	Honda	37.966s
10	Franz Engstler	Liqui Moly Team Engstler	BMW	54.871s
11	Mikhail Kozlovskiy	LADA Sport Lukoil	Lada	1 Lap
12	Hugo Valente	Campos Racing	Chevrolet	1 Lap
13	John Filippi	Campos Racing	SEAT	2 Laps
14	Filipe Souza	Liqui Moly Team Engstler	BMW	3 Laps
15	Ma Qinghua	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	4 Laps
16	Gabriele Tarquini	Castrol Honda WTC Team	Honda	4 Laps
17	Tom Coronel	ROAL Motorsport	Chevrolet	6 Laps
-	Tiago Monteiro	Castrol Honda WTC Team	Honda	Retirement
-	Dusan Borkovic	NIS Petrol by Campos Racing	Chevrolet	Retirement
-	Rene Munnich	All-Inkl.com Munnich Motorsport	Chevrolet	Retirement
-	Michael Soong	Campos Racing	SEAT	Withdrawn

CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS:

Pos	Driver	Points
1	Jose Maria Lopez	327
2	Yvan Muller	271
3	Sebastien Loeb	223
4	Tiago Monteiro	146
5	Gabriele Tarquini	125
6	Tom Chilton	113
7	Norbert Michelisz	108
8	Tom Coronel	100
9	Gianni Morbidelli	97
10	Mehdi Bennani	59