Hungaroring, Race 2: Michelisz claims home triumph!

Norbert Michelisz set the Hungarian crowd on fire, claiming a light to flag victory; his second one in WTCC (after Macau in 2010) but surely the most exciting.

Before an enthusiastic crowd, the Zengö Motorsport driver performed a masterpiece start and jumped all four drivers who where filling the first two rows of the grid. Michelisz pushed hard in the first two laps and created a gap that made easier for him to control the race.

Behind him Pepe Oriola, Mehdi Bennani and Alain Menu fought an exciting battle for the second place that eventually saw the Swiss finishing behind the local hero and Bennani claiming his first WTCC podium ever.

Not far behind Tiago Monteiro put in a great defensive race. For the whole race the Portuguese was able to keep at bay three difficult clients like Gabriele Tarquini, Rob Huff and Yvan Muller. And this earned him a well deserved fifth place, his second of the day.

After winning today’s first race Muller, ended up making a last lap mistake that dropped him from sixth to eighth. A very rare occurrence for him, that must be credited to the incredible pressure that an unchained Stefano D’Aste was putting on him.

Key moments
Start – Michelisz takes a great start and jumps in the lead; a collision at the braking point involves Ng, Wéber and Coronel
Lap 1 – Oriola overtakes Engstler and Bennani to climb to second
Lap 2 – Engstler drops to sixth losing two places to Monteiro and Menu
Lap 2 – Thompson goes off the track after colliding with Wéber
Lap 4 – Menu overtakes Monteiro for fourth
Lap 5 – the trio Tarquini-Huff-Muller overtake Engstler
Lap 6 – D’Aste overtakes Engstler for ninth
Lap 7 – Wéber is given a drive-through for the incident with Thompson
Lap 9 – Menu benefits of the fight between Oriola and Bennani to move up to second
Lap 10 – Bennani overtakes Oriola for third
Lap 12 – Muller makes a mistake to defend the sixth position from D’Aste and drops to eighth

Withdrawals
C. Ng: race incident; J. Thompson: race incident