The 2010 FIA WTCC Race of Brazil (formally the 2010 FIA WTCC HSBC Race of Brazil) was a World Touring Car Championship round held at Autódromo Internacional de Curitiba near Curitiba, Brazil on 7 March 2010. It was the opening round of the 2010 World Touring Car Championship season and the fifth running of the FIA WTCC Race of Brazil. The two races were won by Yvan Muller of Chevrolet and Gabriele Tarquini of SR-Sport
Background Reigning manufacturer's champion SEAT withdrew from the series for the 2010 season. Former SEAT Sport drivers Gabriele Tarquini, Tiago Monteiro and Jordi Gené transferred to new team SR-Sport, run by SUNRED Engineering. BMW reduced their team from five cars to two, with Augusto Farfus joining Andy Priaulx at BMW Team RBM. Chevrolet continue to run three cars, with Yvan Muller replacing Nicola Larini in their line-up. Lada were absent from the opening round of the season. Fredy Barth made his WTCC debut for SUNRED, while Harry Vaulkhard and Darryl O'Young made their first appearances with new team bamboo-engineering.
This was also the first round for the new points system introduced in Formula One. The winning driver would score 25 points, with points going down to tenth place. Points would therefore be awarded 25–18–15–12–10–8–6–4–2–1.
Report
Testing and free practice BMW Team RBM driver Farfus was fastest in Friday's test session with Chevrolet driver Alain Menu second and Farfus' teammate Priaulx third. Tarquini was the fastest SR–Sport driver in sixth, his teammate Jordi Gené stopped early on with steering problems.
BMW stayed on top in free practice one on Saturday morning, with 1–2 with Farfus first and Priaulx second. Huff was the fastest Chevrolet while newcomer and privateer Norbert Michelisz was the lead SEAT. The session was stopped early when Vaulkhard brought out the red flags with three minutes remaining.
SR–Sport and Tarquini was quickest in free practice two, less than five hundredths of a second ahead of Farfus. Priaulx was third and Muller was fourth in the fastest of the Chevrolets. The leading independent was Franz Engstler while Vaulkhard took to the track near the end of the session after repairs to his car following his practice one crash.
Qualifying Chevrolet dominated the first qualifying session of the season. Rob Huff was fastest in Q1 ahead of teammates Alain Menu and Yvan Muller.
Muller set the fastest time in Q2, clinching pole position, while Menu and Huff were third and fourth. SR-Sport's Jordi Gené separated the Chevrolet's by setting the second fastest time. Gabriele Tarquini was fifth, ahead of the BMW's of Andy Priaulx and Augusto Farfus, which had set the pace in the testing and practice sessions earlier in the weekend.http://www.fiawtcc.com/html/uploadedFiles/PDF/RP.1.201036224126.pdf Qualifying Report
Warm-Up After rain fell overnight, the Sunday morning warm–up session took place on a drying track. Priaulx was fastest while pole sitter Muller was fourth. The session was cut short when Tom Coronel went off the track with two minutes remaining.
Race One A torrential downpour shortly before the start of the race led to the first two laps of the race being run behind the safety car. As Muller led the field through the opening corners after they were released, Gené ran wide and lost places to Huff and Menu, before running wide again and dropping to tenth.
Muller led his teammates home for a Chevrolet 1-2-3 on his debut for the team. Reigning champion Tarquini finished fourth, ahead of Andy Priaulx. Augusto Farfus finished sixth after a battle with Tom Coronel that saw the Dutchman drop to eighth behind a recovering Gené. Fredy Barth finished ninth on his world championship debut, after passing Norbert Michelisz on the penultimate lap. Sergio Hernández was top Independent in 13th overall, after starting at the back of the field. He took advantage of contact between class leaders Stefano D'Aste and Darryl O'Young to win.http://www.fiawtcc.com/html/uploadedFiles/PDF/RP.1.20103722221.pdf Race Report
Race Two Tarquini led an SR–Sport 1–2 ahead of Gené. Tarquini had fought off an attack from Priaulx at the first corner, causing the BMW driver to head to the pits for repairs. Gené led the race until lap three until he was passed by Tarquini and the two distanced from the Chevrolet trio of Huff, Menu and Muller. Huff then ran wide and got back on track ahead of Farfus, Huff defended to stay ahead until the finish. Hernández was the winning independent while Priaulx and Coronel were the only two retirements, pole sitter Coronel having retired after contact with Huff on the first lap.
Results
Qualifying Name Team Car Q1 Q2 1 6 Yvan Muller Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 1:23.923 1:23.725 2 4 Jordi Gené SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.157 1:23.757 3 8 Alain Menu Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 1:23.730 1:23.829 4 7 Robert Huff Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 1:23.630 1:23.833 5 1 Gabriele Tarquini SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.125 1:23.834 6 11 Andy Priaulx BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 1:24.034 1:23.955 7 10 Augusto Farfus BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 1:24.006 1:23.981 8 17 Michel Nykjær SUNRED Engineering SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.516 1:24.161 9 2 Tom Coronel SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.558 1:24.325 10 5 Norbert Michelisz Zengő-Dension Team SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.019 1:24.926 11 3 Tiago Monteiro SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.562 12 18 Fredy Barth SEAT Swiss Racing by SUNRED SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1:24.983 13 26 Stefano D'Aste Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 1:25.153 14 20 Darryl O'Young bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 1:25.328 15 21 Mehdi Bennani Wiechers-Sport BMW 320siY 1:25.486 16 15 Franz Engstler Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 1:25.547 17 25 Sergio Hernández Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 1:25.826 18 19 Harry Vaulkhard bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 1:25.841 19 16 Andrei Romanov Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 1:27.567
Race 1 Name Team Car Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 6 Yvan Muller Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 16 26:57.181 1 25 2 7 Robert Huff Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 16 +1.053 4 18 3 8 Alain Menu Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 16 +5.582 3 15 4 1 Gabriele Tarquini SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +7.136 5 12 5 11 Andy Priaulx BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 16 +11.625 6 10 6 10 Augusto Farfus BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 16 +12.098 7 8 7 4 Jordi Gené SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +14.379 2 6 8 2 Tom Coronel SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +14.647 9 4 9 18 Fredy Barth SEAT Swiss Racing by SUNRED SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +18.773 12 2 10 5 Norbert Michelisz Zengő-Dension Team SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +20.359 10 1 11 3 Tiago Monteiro SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +21.691 11 12 17 Michel Nykjær SUNRED Engineering SEAT León 2.0 TDI 16 +22.645 8 13 25 Sergio Hernández Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 16 +34.973 19 14 15 Franz Engstler Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 16 +38.092 16 15 20 Darryl O'Young bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 16 +44.692 14 16 19 Harry Vaulkhard bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 16 +50.005 17 17 26 Stefano D'Aste Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 16 +50.742 13 18 21 Mehdi Bennani Wiechers-Sport BMW 320siY 16 +1:20.825 15 Ret 16 Andrei Romanov Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 5 Race incident 18 Bold denotes Fastest lap.
Race 2 Name Team Car Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 1 Gabriele Tarquini SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 20:13.311 5 25 2 4 Jordi Gené SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 +1.276 2 18 3 8 Alain Menu Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 14 +5.407 6 15 4 6 Yvan Muller Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 14 +5.985 8 12 5 7 Robert Huff Chevrolet RML Chevrolet Cruze LT 14 +8.295 7 10 6 10 Augusto Farfus BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 14 +8.596 3 8 7 3 Tiago Monteiro SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 +10.419 11 6 8 17 Michel Nykjær SUNRED Engineering SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 +11.808 12 4 9 5 Norbert Michelisz Zengő-Dension Team SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 +17.576 10 2 10 25 Sergio Hernández Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 14 +24.244 13 1 11 15 Franz Engstler Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 14 +24.643 14 12 21 Mehdi Bennani Wiechers-Sport BMW 320siY 14 +30.072 18 13 19 Harry Vaulkhard bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 14 +30.923 16 14 26 Stefano D'Aste Scuderia Proteam Motorsport BMW 320siY 14 +40.328 17 15 20 Darryl O'Young bamboo-engineering Chevrolet LacettiY 14 +40.481 15 16 18 Fredy Barth SEAT Swiss Racing by SUNRED SEAT León 2.0 TDI 14 +1:09.780 9 Ret 2 Tom Coronel SR-Sport SEAT León 2.0 TDI 1 Race incident 1 Ret 11 Andy Priaulx BMW Team RBM BMW 320si 0 Race incident 4 DNS 16 Andrei Romanov Liqui Moly Team Engstler BMW 320siY 0 Did not start 19 Bold denotes Fastest lap.
Standings after the event
Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 Yvan Muller 37 2 Gabriele Tarquini 37 3 Alain Menu 30 4 Robert Huff 28 5 Jordi Gené 24
Yokohama Independents' Trophy standings Pos Driver Points 1 Sergio Hernández 23 2 Franz Engstler 16 3 Harry Vaulkhard 10 4 Mehdi Bennani 9 5 Darryl O'Young 9
Manufacturers' Championship standings Pos Manufacturer Points 1 Chevrolet 70 2 SEAT Customers Technology 66 3 BMW 40
Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of drivers' standings.
References
Results Booklet PDF at MST Systems
External links World Touring Car Championship official website