ADVAN POWERS FARFUS TO WIN ON HOME TRACK


Media information, 11 March 2007


Brazil's opening round of the 2007 FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) went to the home fans'favourite, Augusto Farfus Jr, after a stunning drive saw the Brazilian make the most of his ADVAN tires.

Overtaking SEAT driver Yvan Muller for the lead, Farfus started to pull away right from the start and maintained a healthy lead for nearly the full 16 laps, much to the delight of Curitiba's capacity crowd.

The BMW driver, who was born close to the circuit, pushed his tires right to the end of today's second race as team-mate, Andy Priaulx, started gaining on him in the final stages.

"We made a few changes to the car after the first race," said Farfus. "I had a good feeling with my engineer that this was going to work and it was fantastic! I didn't want to push too hard to start with but when I saw that Andy was getting close, I decided to try and I found it really easy to keep pushing."

Race one's rolling start proved to be every bit as exciting as it promised with cars able to get up to speed much sooner in the first lap.
The early pace caught a few drivers out with a first-corner incident but most used their tires wisely, getting as much heat as possible into them for maximum grip.

BMW claimed the top three spots, with pole-sitter Jorg Muller maintaining his lead throughout followed by fellow BMW drivers Andy Priaulx and Augusto Farfus Jr.

"This was a tough race," said Muller. "But thankfully I managed to hold everyone off and take the first win. It was a difficult situation but at least I knew that the rolling start would be ok; I had Andy and Augusto behind me so I knew I was safe."

Yokohama Europe Marketing Manager Kazuyoshi Sekiguchi was equally pleased with the day's racing: "Brazil delivered some extremely hot racing to go with the hot temperatures," he said. "The amount of overtaking and close racing to be had in both of today's races shows how much grip the ADVAN tires provided.

"Drivers throughout the field felt confident enough to push on a very hot track, which is exactly what we hope for as a manufacturer of racing tires."