|
Weather:
sunny and hot with a
dry track.
SEAT
SPORT CLAIM A 1-2 FINISH
SEAT
Sport drivers Yvan
Muller and Rickard Rydell held off the BMW Team
Germany's attack of
Augusto
Farfus and Jörg Müller, to win the first race in Curitiba.
This
was a tough race for the leading two, who in the final laps had to work hard to
defend their position as their tyres were wearing out. However, it was even
tougher for Chevrolet. On lap 3 Nicola Larini made contact with
Robert Huff,
who spun in the centre of the racetrack. Larini could not continue the race, but
Huff continued and began to make up ground by overtaking Félix Porteiro, only to
pit on lap 8 with rear suspension failure; a late result of the collision.
Alain Menu had
also pitted earlier following a shunt with Jordi Gené and did not resume the
race.
Farfus
had a poor start falling back to fifth, as he was one of cars to take to the
grass at the first corner. However, he quickly made up ground passing Müller on
lap 3, and then both of them passed Gabriele Tarquini on lap 8 moving
up to third and fourth respectively. For the remainder of the race Farfus chased
the leading cars, but on the final lap came under pressure from his team mate
and had to defend third place until the finish.
Reigning
world champion Andy
Priaulx took fifth spot following late overtaking of Tarquini
and Gené. Porteiro made up the top eight finishers in the race, overtaking Tom
Coronel. However it will be Tom Coronel (9th classified)
to start from pole on the reverse grid of the second race as Gené was given a 30
second penalty due to hitting Menu.
In
the Independents' class the fight for the first place between Pierre-Yves Corthals
and Sergio Hernández ended in a final lap contact. Corthals crossed the line
first but eventually he was given a 30-second penalty and Olivier Tielemans
inherited victory.
BULLET
NEWS
BUREAU
LIMITS DIESEL TURBO PRESSURE
The
FIA Touring Car Bureau have issued a decision this morning to limit the
supercharged air pressure and the fuel rail pressure on the SEAT León
TDI cars.
Both
pressures have been limited to the average maximum values measured by the FIA
data logger during yesterday's qualifying session.
This
decision only applies to the current race meeting.
ALAIN
MENU
BACK IN ACTION
Alain
Menu
has fully recovered from his crash during yesterday's qualifying session. The
Swiss driver was discharged by Curitiba's Cajuru hospital after all the scans
were negative and this morning he was cleared to race after a final check from
the FIA medical delegate.
The
Chevrolet team worked until 1.00am on Sunday morning to repair his Lacetti car
that suffered from extensive damage to the bodywork and suspension.
WARMUP
- FARFUS FASTEST, D'ASTE CRASHES
Stefano
D'Aste crashed at turn 9 near to the end of the warm up session, seriously
damaging his BMW, but escaped unharmed. However Proteam Motorsport's mechanics
were able to repair the car in time for the races.
The
crash happened with one minute to go in the session, which was red flagged and
not resumed. This left Augusto Farfus as fastest with a
time of 1:24.237 leading a BMW 1-2-3 from Jörg Müller and Andy
Priaulx.
THEY
SAID, THEY SAID.
Yvan
MULLER
"I
wasn't expecting to keep my position for the whole race for several reasons: the
temperature went up very quickly and the weather wasn't in our favour. Also the
lap times of the BMW showed they were very consistently quick, and it was hard.
It wasn't easy at all because any small mistake could have caused the end, so we
had attack all the way through."
Rickard
RYDELL
"I
am very pleased with the result today. It was one of the toughest races I have
had and it was clear that BMW were half a second quicker than us and they
pushed. Yvan and I have to thank Gabriele (Tarquini) because without him there
we would have had to deal with the pressure for the whole race, but we only had
to it for half of the race. I really didn't think it would be possible to keep
Farfus behind me."
Augusto
FARFUS
"I
was right on the limit and could not have pushed more, we were quite strong and
they did a very good job. It is very hard to overtake in those conditions and I
am happy with 3rd as the championship is very long. The start wasn't
the problem, but there was a bit of a mess at the first corner and I went onto
the grass and was able to slot into 5th
place."
Pierre-Yves
CORTHALS
"I
couldn't have wished for a better start, I am sorry for Coronel who I bumped,
but I am happy. I had a good fight with Hernández, he passed me but on the last
last he braked really early compared to me and I slightly bumped him, for which
I am sorry, and went through."
|
