The world's pinnacle of touring cars' sprint races, the FIA World Touring Car Championship, which is often described as "combat sport on the circuit," raised its curtain in Curitiba, Brazil, as has been the case these years.

The WTCC series entered the sixth year since its inception in 2005 and it has solely relied on the ADVAN racing tires, with the only exception being the series' inaugural year. It is well know that all participating teams and drivers have trust in the tires, despite the fact that different cars with different chassis layout and characteristics use the single spec tires in WTCC.

ADVAN is contracted to supply the tires for WTCC until 2012 season. And the Japanese tire manufacture aroused a fresh interest by introducing the ECO Racing Tires which have even better environmental performance this year.

In the qualifying session Part 1, in which drivers are narrowed down to the top ten, the Chevrolet drivers made a good showing, led by Rob Huff and he was followed by his teammates, Alain Menu and newly-signed Yvan Muller who moved in from SEAT this year.

And it was the 2008 champion who showed off his ability in Part 2. Among the three Chevrolets plus two factory-entered BMWs and five diesel-powered SEATs which went on to the second part, Muller was the fastest and sat on the pole position. While Jordi Gene in a SEAT got the second grid, the other two Chevrolet drivers also took up the grids close to the front, Menu in third and Huff in fourth.

Unfortunately, the track was hit by rain after the warm-up session in Sunday morning. All the drivers on the grid, led by Muller, had to start Race 1 on the wet surfaces which they experienced for the first time this race weekend.

For safety reasons, the race began with the Safety Car Start. But from Lap 3 when the race properly started, Chevrolets were clearly faster and consistent. Gene valiantly tried to snatch the lead position from Muller at Esse de Baixa (Turn 1) but the Spaniard ran wide in the corner and lost a few positions.

His unsuccessful move eventually made up a Chevrolet's 1-2-3 formation and they just pulled away. Between the teammates, Huff registered the fastest lap during the race on Lap 15 and closed the gap with Muller, but it wasn't enough to threaten the race leader. The Frenchman led throughout the race and scored the first win with his new team in the first attempt to do so. Huff and Menu followed and completed a all Chevrolet podium.

The YOKOHAMA Independent Trophy class was initially contended between Darryl O'Young in a bamboo racing's ex-factory Chevrolet Lacetti and Stefano D'Aste. But they made contact during the battle and allowed Sergio Hernandez to take over the lead position and went on to the class victory, despite he had to start the back end of the grids due to his engine change after the warm-up session.

The rain stopped during Race 1 and the conditions were rapidly improved. Even in the closing stage of the first race, the track surfaces were already drying and, after a one hour intermission, Race 2 started on the totally dry surfaces. It was like a reversal of last year's Curitiba round, as it had been dry in the first race and then turned to wet in the second.

On the reversed grid for Race 2, the eighth finisher of Race 1, Tom Coronel, shared the front row with his teammate Gene, followed by Augusto Farfus in one of two factory BMWs.

Many expected an interesting fight when those leading drivers make dives to the first corner on the dried-out surfaces. However, Coronel's start wasn't a good one, which he greatly regretted, and he couldn't make the best of his pole position. And to make a bad situation worse, the Dutchman tangled with Huff and went off the course at Turn 1...

The start was also one to forget for BMW Team RBM, as their drivers, Farfus and Andy Priaulx, made contact with each other, which resulted in a serious damage on the right front corner of Priaulx's car. The Brazilian survived the incident but wasn't able to hope to win in his homeland, showing a rather lackluster performance throughout.

Ahead of those accidents, Gene took the initial lead. Trying to make up for his mistake in Race 1, he drove brilliantly for the first two laps but his Italian teammate, Gabriele Tarquini, dived into inside at Turn 1 of Lap 3 and managed to get ahead of him. The new leader immediately set the fastest lap of the race on Lap 4 and pulled away to secure the victory without being threatened by anyone on his way.

The battle of independent class was really hot again and, especially in the middle phase of the race, Franz Engstler pushed the leader, Hernandez, so hard but the Spaniard fended it off to clinch his second win of the day.

In this Brazilian round, the ADVAN Eco Racing Tires for WTCC made a debut. Compared with the data from last year's race, the new tires which excel in environmental performance were still able to set the times around the same level both in qualifying and race. The fact confirmed that the ADVAN racing tires retained the renowned high performance on the track, even after being redesigned to improve its environmental performance significantly.