Menu takes commanding win in first race at Suzuka

The Swiss driver's pole position kept him clear of a chaotic run to the first corner, which removed the Chevrolet's biggest threat in the form of Robert Dahlgren's Volvo, and then capitalised on team-mate running Yvan Muller running wide through Turn 7 a few laps later to secure complete control of the race.

He crossed the line more than three seconds ahead of fellow Chevy racer Rob Huff, while SUNRED's Michel Nykjaer was able to keep Muller at bay to claim third outright in his independent SEAT.

The first corner skirmish dictated the shape of the race. Dahlgren, whose Volvo had been a close match to the Chevys on speed all weekend, was tagged from behind at the start and found himself in the barriers before he'd even turned into the first corner, while elsewhere in the pack two other simultaneous accidents left Tiago Monteiro out of the race and Tom Coronel and Hiroki Yoshimoto facing lengthy repairs.

There was better fortune for Gabriele Tarquini, who managed to spin right through the centre of the pack without sustaining any significant damage. The Italian eventually recovered to ninth.

Race 1 Results - 25 laps:

Pos  Driver              Team/Car            Time/Gap
 1.  Alain Menu          Chevrolet         25m50.919s
 2.  Rob Huff            Chevrolet           + 3.133s
 3.  Michel Nykjaer      SUNRED SEAT         + 3.766s
 4.  Yvan Muller         Chevrolet           + 4.441s
 5.  Kristian Poulsen    Engstler BMW        + 4.851s
 6.  Colin Turkington    Wiechers BMW        + 8.601s
 7.  Yukinori Taniguchi  Bamboo Chevrolet   + 13.472s
 8.  Mehdi Bennani       Proteam BMW        + 13.730s
 9.  Gabriele Tarquini   SUNRED SEAT        + 14.045s
10.  Norbert Michelisz   Zengo BMW          + 14.478s
11.  Franz Engstler      Engstler BMW       + 15.950s
12.  Javier Villa        Proteam BMW        + 20.554s
13.  Darryl O'Young      Bamboo Chevrolet   + 20.833s
14.  Masaki Kano         KK BMW             + 25.889s
15.  Toshi Arai          Chevrolet          + 26.767s
16.  Charles Ng          Engstler BMW       + 39.298s
17.  Aleksei Dudukalo    SUNRED SEAT        + 46.031s
18.  Pepe Oriola         SUNRED SEAT         + 5 laps

Retirements:

     Hiroki Yoshimoto    SUNRED SEAT          11 laps
     Tom Coronel         ROAL BMW              5 laps
     Fredy Barth         SUNRED SEAT           2 laps
     Robert Dahlgren     Polestar Volvo        0 laps
     Tiago Monteiro      SUNRED SEAT           0 laps