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WTCC Hungaroring: Monteiro victory extends championship lead

Tiago Monteiro became the first repeat winner of the World Touring Car Championship season by resisting a challenge from Tom Chilton in the opening race at the Hungaroring

Honda driver Monteiro had started the reversed-grid race from second but inherited the lead at the start when polesitter John Filippi stalled, and held Chilton at arm's length for the duration of the 12-lap race to claim his 11th win in the championship.

Victory extends Monteiro's points lead to 40 points.

"We needed that after a hard qualifying," said Monteiro.

"We knew we had a good opportunity but it's never easy to take it.

"I had good pressure from Tom all race, but I had a good car and I was able to push when I needed it."

As Monteiro got away cleanly at the start, Chilton was able to jump the Volvo of Thed Bjork on the run to Turn 1 despite having to jink clear of SLR team-mate Filippi.

Bjork then came under pressure from home favourite Norbert Michelisz in the second Honda Civic, but both of their races were undone on the opening lap with both slowing as a result of contact through the opening sequence of corners.

That minor altercation as the pair briefly squabbled for third allowed the lead duo to escape and build a buffer that proved too difficult for the chasing pack to bridge, with Monteiro eventually winning by 0.768 seconds.

Main race polesitter Rob Huff ended up best of the rest in third after a spirited charge from ninth, the Brit fighting his way past the Volvo of Nestor Girolami on the penultimate lap.

Having cleared the Campos Racing Chevrolet Cruze of Esteban Guerrieri, Huff applied pressure to Girolami in the closing stages and found a way past through the looped Turn 2 hairpin.

Sticking to the outside line Huff had a good enough run off Turn 1 to hang around the outside at Turn 2, and then had the inside for the following right-hander before brushing Girolami wide to seal the final podium slot.

Behind Girolami, Nicky Catsburg was also able to usurp Guerrieri to claim fifth in the closing stages in his sister Volvo S60 Polestar, while Chilton's SLR team-mate Mehdi Bennani advanced from 14th to claim seventh behind the Cruze of Guerrieri.

In the lower points paying positions, Yann Ehrlacher was a lonely eighth in his RC Motorsport Lada Vesta, eight seconds clear of the ROAL Motorsport Chevrolet Cruze of Tom Coronel.

Aurelien Panis claimed the final point on the final lap when Filippi stopped on-track.

RESULT - 12 LAPS:

Pos Driver Team Car Gap
1 Tiago Monteiro Honda Racing Team JAS Honda 22m28.644s
2 Tom Chilton Sebastien Loeb Racing Citroen 0.768s
3 Rob Huff Munnich Motorsport Citroen 2.296s
4 Nestor Girolami Polestar Cyan Racing Volvo 4.537s
5 Nicky Catsburg Polestar Cyan Racing Volvo 5.221s
6 Esteban Guerrieri Campos Racing Chevrolet 10.308s
7 Mehdi Bennani Sebastien Loeb Racing Citroen 10.893s
8 Yann Ehrlacher RC Motorsport Lada 13.183s
9 Tom Coronel ROAL Motorsport Chevrolet 21.703s
10 Aurelien Panis Zengo Motorsport Honda 37.886s
11 Ryo Michigami Honda Racing Team JAS Honda 38.532s
12 Kevin Gleason RC Motorsport Lada 38.808s
13 Daniel Nagy Zengo Motorsport Honda 39.607s
14 John Filippi Sebastien Loeb Racing Citroen 1 Lap
- Norbert Michelisz Honda Racing Team JAS Honda Retirement
- Thed Bjork Polestar Cyan Racing Volvo Retirement

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