Priaulx dominates race one

The race was interrupted by a long safety car period after Roberto Colciago's independent SEAT had a heavy impact with the barriers. Priaulx had already opened out a few seconds' lead before the full course yellow, and he quickly rebuilt the advantage after the restart.

"It's fantastic, I'm very, very pleased," Priaulx said. "The restart was important because Yvan and 'Thommo' were looking quick in my rear view mirrors."

Dirk Muller took second place from Yvan Muller going into the first chicane on lap two, but could not shake the SEAT off. After many laps of concerted pressure, Yvan M got alongside Dirk M through the Parabolica with three laps remaining.

The cars were wheel to wheel down the pits straight before the SEAT claimed the place under braking. Two laps later, the second ORECA SEAT of James Thompson repeated the move to secure third place, leaving Muller to finish fourth.

Excessive wheelspin at the start led to Augusto Farfus dropping back from third, and he was then rammed by his late braking teammate Salvatore Tavano at the first corner. While the latter retired, Farfus continued despite rear bodywork damage, and spent the race battling for fifth with the SEATs of Gabriele Tarquini and Rickard Rydell, and Alex Zanardi, who had heavily damaged his BMW in a warm-up accident.

Farfus eventually dropped back to finish eighth and claim pole position on the reverse grid for race two.

Alessandro Balzan won the Independents' class in ninth overall, while Peter Terting brought his SEAT through from the rear of the 36-car grid (after an engine failure at the start of qualifying) to take 13th.

Race one result:

Pos  Driver       Make         Time
 1.  A Priaulx     BMW         25:44.220
 2.  Y Muller      SEAT        + 3.534
 3.  J Thompson    SEAT        + 4.378
 4.  D Muller      BMW         + 4.667
 5.  G Tarquini    SEAT        + 7.332
 6.  R Rydell      SEAT        + 7.639
 7.  A Zanardi     BMW         + 8.339
 8.  A Farfus      Alfa Romeo  + 12.908
 9.  A Balzan      Alfa Romeo  + 14.480
10.  A Menu        Chevrolet   + 14.871
11.  M Costa       BMW         + 16.020
12.  J Gene        SEAT        + 16.642
13.  P Terting     SEAT        + 17.767
14.  S D'Aste      BMW         + 18.064
15.  L Rangoni     BMW         + 18.324
16.  S Iacone      BMW         + 23.050
17.  R Romagnoli   Alfa Romeo  + 27.193
18.  R Sharp       Honda       + 27.343
19.  Rob Huff      Chevrolet   + 32.291
20.  D Romanini    BMW         + 33.259
21.  J Janak       Alfa Romeo  + 33.624 
22.  P-Y Corthals  Honda       + 34.256
23.  D Roda        SEAT        + 35.907
24.  S Valli       BMW         + 38.734
25.  M Ceresoli    SEAT        + 50.883
26.  E O'Brien     BMW         + 2 laps
27.  N Larini      Chevrolet   + 2 laps
28.  J Muller      BMW         + 2 laps
29.  G Morbidelli  Alfa Romeo  + 3 laps
30.  E Naspetti    BMW         + 3 laps
31.  T Coronel     SEAT        + 6 laps
32.  J Edman       Peugeot     + 8 laps
33.  R Colciago    SEAT        + 9 laps
34.  S Tavano      Alfa Romeo  + 10 laps
35.  E Marchetti   Alfa Romeo  + 11 laps