Moscow WTCC: Catsburg takes maiden win, completes Lada double

The Dutchman had a great start from pole position ahead of his two Lada team-mates, while the rain that had hit the first race had started to abate, but not enough for slick tyres at the start.

Catsburg began to build a lead over Tarquini, but hopes of Lada following up their 1-2 result in the opening race with a 1-2-3 in race two were soon crushed when the Honda of Norbert Michelisz passed the third-placed Lada of Hugo Valente, who seemed to be struggling with his set-up.

The Hondas which had struggled in the first race in the wet conditions were much stronger in the main race.

Citroen, meanwhile, went the other way, with Jose Maria Lopez and Yvan Muller fighting to hold off the cars behind them, with Lopez dropping down to eighth by the finish and Muller falling outside of the points to tenth, being passed by the privateer Zengo Honda of Ferenc Ficza with two laps to go.

Rob Huff worked his way up to fourth , with Tiago Monteiro finishing fifth after getting ahead of Valente at the final corner on lap 14.

The Frenchman would fall one further position behind the best-placed independent driver in the race, the Munnich Motorsport Chevrolet of James Thompson who finished the race in sixth.

With the conditions continuing to dry out, the question was whether the wet tyres would last, with Catsburg slower than a fast-closing Tarquini during the final stages, but the Dutchman was able to keep pace his Italian team-mate to score his first victory on his one-year anniversary in the championship, leading by one second at the finish.

“We’re absolutely over the moon,” said Catbsurg. “To have two 1-2s in front of our home crowd and sponsors, but the main race wasn’t easy, as Gabriele was so fast, so we had to keep pushing until the last lap.”

Although Lopez had a relatively forgettable weekend, the Argentinian still extends his lead in the drivers’ championship, though his closest rival is Sebastien Loeb Racing Citroen of Mehdi Bennani and now Catsburg, who took a massive 48 point leap up the order to move from eighth to second, both 105 points behind.

Main race results:

Pos	Driver	Car	Time/Gap
1	Nicky Catsburg	Lada Vesta WTCC	33:00.149
2	Gabriele Tarquini	Lada Vesta WTCC	+1.011
3	Norbert Michelisz	Honda Civic WTCC	+13.681
4	Rob Huff	Honda Civic WTCC	+20.120
5	Tiago Monteiro	Honda Civic WTCC	+25.497
6	James Thompson	Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1	+29.838
7	Hugo Valente	Lada Vesta WTCC	+30.611
8	Jose Maria Lopez	Citroen C-Elysée WTCC	+36.168
9	Ferenc Ficza	Honda Civic WTCC	+37.289
10	Mehdi Bennani	Citroen C-Elysée WTCC	+42.772
11	Yvan Muller	Citroen C-Elysée WTCC	+45.498
12	Fredrik Ekblom	Volvo S60 WTCC	+54.460
13	Grégoire Demoustier	Citroen C-Elysée WTCC	+56.782
14	John Filippi	Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1	+1:05.333
15	Thed Björk	Volvo S60 WTCC	+1:19.323
16	Tom Chilton	Citroen C-Elysée WTCC	+1 lap
R	Tom Coronel	Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1