[ad_1]
Sébastien Loeb Racing's Rob Huff won the second round of the FIA Touring Car World Cup (WTCR) at Suzuka, after pioneering pole-position winner Pepe Oriola.
At the front row of the grid, Huff had a better start than Oriole's Campos Racing CUPRA, putting his Volkswagen inside the first corner while the Spaniard, outside of the pole, did not not moved aggressively to cover the line.
The Brit then appeared comfortable at the front of the race, managing his gap over Oriola to win a second win of the season.
Oriola was not back against Huff and secured his seventh podium of the season in second place, while Norbert Michelisz of BRC Racing completed the podium in third place after securing a decisive spot in the Audi Denis Dupont in the third round.
The race was only briefly interrupted by the intervention of a safety car when Esteban Guerrieri was thrown into the gravel at turn 4 in the first lap, shortly after the Münnich Motorsport driver overtook Mehdi Bennani of SLR outside on Turn 3, with Bennani getting in touch with Guerrieri's Honda to get him out of the circuit.
Comtoyou Racing 's Aurélien Panis was Audi' s best driver in fourth position after his teammate, Denis Dupont, lost control on the eighth lap when he started fighting with his car late in the race.
The fall of Dupont allowed Gabriele Tarquini of BRC Racing to finish fifth and, in doing so, the Italian got a slight advantage of ten points at the top of the drivers standings.
Kevin Ceccon of Team Mulsanne brought his Alfa Romeo back to sixth place. The Italian managed a pass at the right moment for DG Sport's Aurélien Comte for the post at the Spoon Curve in the seventh round.
Comte had to be satisfied with the eighth place of his Peugeot, in front of the second Volkswagen reflex of Bennani in ninth and Yann Ehrlacher of Münnich Motorsport in the tenth. Ehrlacher had to start the race from 12th after receiving a penalty of five places on the grid for joining the circuit during the first race of Saturday.
In the title race, none of the YMR Hyundai drivers scored a point, Yvan Muller being the best of the duo in 11th in law. Thed Björk, qualified only in 13th, made no progress in the race and finished the race where he started, leaving the Swede 27 points from the top of the table with only four races to go.
Zengo Motorsport's Zsolt Szabó was the only other driver to give up. He had fallen on the shoulder of the third round, John Filippi, and had to withdraw from the circuit because of the damage suffered around the round.
The third race is scheduled for 12:30 local time (03:30 GMT, 04:30 CET).
Race result
Source link
