Shanghai WTCC: Yvan Muller beats Gabriele Tarquini to win race two
Yvan Muller claimed victory for Citroen in the final race World Touring Car Championship race at Shanghai, denying Honda's Gabriele Tarquini
Muller made a good start to get in front of team-mate and championship leader Jose Maria Lopez from the line as he chased down Tarquini - who claimed the lead after a wheel-to-wheel battle with polesitter Hugo Valente.
Valente sustained damage to his rear suspension as a result of his first lap tussle with Tarquini and was forced to retire.
Muller made his move on leader Tarquini on lap nine of 15, executing a clean and easy overtake on the Italian.
He then pulled away to form a three-second lead as Tarquini came under pressure from Lopez and Sebastian Loeb.
Despite the best efforts of a charging Lopez, he could find no way past Tarquini to take second and ultimately it was a photo finish across the line. Loeb ended his race in fourth.
There was a poor start for the Lada team, with its Shanghai pacesetter Nicky Catsburg eventually retiring with undisclosed mechanical problems.
Rob Huff managed to fight his way up to finish a strong fifth despite sustaining damage in an accident in race one.
The same accident meant neither ROAL Motorsport Chevrolet of Tom Chilton or Tom Coronel could get out for race two.
Mechanical issues for home favourite Ma Qing Hua in race one left question marks over his participation too, but he did manage to get out and ended the weekend with an eighth position.
RESULTS - 14 LAPS:
Pos | Driver | Team | Car | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Yvan Muller | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 26m36.942s |
2 | Gabriele Tarquini | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 2.659s |
3 | Jose Maria Lopez | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 2.684s |
4 | Sebastien Loeb | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 6.079s |
5 | Rob Huff | LADA Sport Rosneft | Lada | 8.366s |
6 | Tiago Monteiro | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 11.224s |
7 | Mehdi Bennani | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 14.339s |
8 | Ma Qinghua | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 15.378s |
9 | Nicolas Lapierre | LADA Sport Rosneft | Lada | 24.968s |
10 | John Filippi | Campos Racing | Chevrolet | 27.357s |
11 | Norbert Michelisz | Zengo Motorsport | Honda | 28.270s |
12 | Gregoire Demoustier | Craft-Bamboo Racing | Chevrolet | 28.654s |
13 | Stefano D'Aste | All-Inkl.com Munnich Motorsport | Chevrolet | 3 Laps |
- | Nicky Catsburg | LADA Sport Rosneft | Lada | Retirement |
- | Hugo Valente | Campos Racing | Chevrolet | Retirement |
- | Tom Chilton | ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet | Not started |
- | Tom Coronel | ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet | Not started |
CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS:
Pos | Driver | Points |
---|---|---|
1 | Jose Maria Lopez | 396 |
2 | Yvan Muller | 321 |
3 | Sebastien Loeb | 282 |
4 | Ma Qinghua | 178 |
5 | Norbert Michelisz | 172 |
6 | Gabriele Tarquini | 171 |
7 | Tiago Monteiro | 165 |
8 | Hugo Valente | 95 |
9 | Rob Huff | 87 |
10 | Tom Chilton | 84 |
11 | Mehdi Bennani | 76 |
12 | Tom Coronel | 39 |
13 | Nicky Catsburg | 38 |
14 | Stefano D'Aste | 20 |
15 | Jaap van Lagen | 16 |
16 | James Thompson | 6 |
17 | Nicolas Lapierre | 6 |
18 | John Filippi | 6 |
19 | Nestor Girolami | 5 |
20 | Rickard Rydell | 4 |
21 | Gregoire Demoustier | 2 |
22 | Sabine Schmitz | 1 |
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