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WTCC Moscow: Nykjaer denies Muller in race two

Michel Nykjaer withstood a late Yvan Muller charge to claim his third win of 2013 in the World Touring Car Championship's Moscow Raceway finale

The Dane had started from an inherited second on the grid, but failed to capitalise and ended up having to defend heavily from the chasing pack.

That tardy getaway allowed polesitter Mehdi Bennani to establish a 1.3-second advantage by the end of the first tour alone, but Nykjaer slowly began reeling the Moroccan in.

By lap four Nykjaer nosed ahead coming out of the final turn, only for Bennani - chasing a maiden series win - to nudge him wide and recapture the advantage.

Three laps later though, Nykjaer made the move stick and then began to pull away from Bennani, who fell into the clutches of the chasing pack.

That had initially been led by Gabriele Tarquini and James Thompson, but both drivers dropped down the order following a five-car spat on lap three.

Tom Coronel had already picked his way past Thompson and then dived past Tarquini in the middle split, meaning the trio went three-wide down the back straight.

They remained in similar formation around the hairpin and onto the pit straight, but behind Rob Huff and Muller were able to get a better run and made it a five-wide fight heading into Turn 1.

Coronel, in the middle, edged right slightly to avoid Muller but ended up sweeping across Tarquini and spinning into Thompson, putting both men into the barriers.

Tarquini withstood the damage but dropped down the order, with Huff and Muller moving into third and fourth respectively.

It stayed like that until, with four laps to go, Huff dived down the inside of Bennani at the final turn, only to run deep and allow the Moroccan and Muller through.

Muller picked off Bennani almost immediately, but then ran out of time to pass Nykjaer, finishing less than half a second down the road.

Huff meanwhile finally claimed third two laps from the finish when Bennani, again forced onto the defensive heading into the final turn, lost his car under braking and span, slipping to 16th.

Pepe Oriola benefited to claim fourth ahead of Norbert Michelisz, Tom Chilton and Tarquini.

Results - 13 laps:

Pos Driver               Team/Car             Time/Gap
 1. Michel Nykjaer       Nika Chevrolet     22m53.698s
 2. Yvan Muller          RML Chevrolet        + 0.379s
 3. Rob Huff             Munnich SEAT         + 6.418s
 4. Pepe Oriola          Tuenti SEAT          + 7.494s
 5. Norbert Michelisz    Zengo Honda          + 8.075s
 6. Tom Chilton          RML Chevrolet        + 8.682s
 7. Gabriele Tarquini    Honda                + 9.537s
 8. Stefano D'Aste       PB BMW               + 10.306s
 9. Darryl O'Young       ROAL BMW             + 13.427s
10. James Nash           Bamboo Chevrolet     + 14.223s
11. Alex MacDowall       Bamboo Chevrolet     + 16.581s
12. Tiago Monteiro       Honda                + 17.560s
13. Marc Basseng         Munnich SEAT         + 18.776s
14. Tom Coronel          ROAL BMW             + 20.716s
15. Franz Engstler       Engstler BMW         + 21.031s
16. Mehdi Bennani        Proteam BMW          + 22.834s
17. Nikolai Karamyshev   Campos SEAT          + 23.852s
18. Fernando Monje       Campos SEAT          + 24.400s
19. Rene Munnich         Munnich SEAT         + 2 laps

Retirements:

    Mikhail Kozlovskiy   Lada                   7 laps
    James Thompson       Lada                   4 laps
    Charles Ng           Engstler BMW           1 lap


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