The seventh round of the 2012 World Touring Car Championship was held at Autodromo Internacional do Algarve, Portugal. This was the last stop of the European leg of the championship that tours around the world. After this round, there's a six week interval until the next Brazilian round and then the championship will visit America, for the first time, Japan, China and Macau for the final races.

The race track in Portimao hosted the WTCC event for the second time, following a one year absence from the championship's calendar. The key player of the early stage of this round was the SEAT's ace Gabriele Tarquini. After taking the top slot of Free Practice 1, the Italian was also fastest in Q1 session against the three Chevrolet factory drivers. His momentum continued in Q2, fought by the top 12 drivers in the previous session, and Tarquini secured his second pole position of the season since the curtain raiser at Monza, by getting into a 1'53" bracket as the only driver to do so.

The race day was favored by a fine weather. At the start of Race 1, however, a Chevrolet driver got into the starring role after all. Starting from the second grid, Yvan Muller got better acceleration than the pole sitter when the race began with a rolling start and led the field when they entered the first corner by overtaking Tarquini from the outside. Behind them, the local hero, Tiago Monteiro in the sole Sunred Leon 1.6T, got ahead of the Gabor Weber's BMW, after starting from the eighth grid in front of his home crowd.

As for the YOKOHAMA Trophy contenders, the current runner-up of the championship, Norbert Michelisz started the race from the third grid, which alone was remarkable, and was leading the field. But the championship leader, Pepe Oriola, was already in a hot pursuit from the tenth grid start.

Oriola was joined by Aleksei Dudukalo, who started from the 12th in a SEAT Leon WTCC, Albert Cerqui and Weber in the congested chasing pack. However, when Dudukalo rejoined the track after a brief excursion, he hit the Weber's car and both of them were eventually forced to retire due to the damage caused by the incident.

By the way, Alain Menu was driving the special liveried Chevrolet Cruze which featured the popular French comic Michel Vaillant in this event and it made his presence even more prominent. Although he had to settle for ninth in the qualifying, he was one of the rapid movers in Race 1, especially in the second half of the race, and attracted much attention not only for the car's livery but for his strong performance.

The Swiss, playing heroic role of Vaillant, actually made a move on Monteiro at Turn 1 of Lap 4 and got ahead of the Portuguese by taking a cross line at the corner. Now running in sixth, he then caught up to Tom Coronel on the pit straight two laps later and passed the BMW driver when they were entering Turn 1 to earn the fifth place finish.

Meanwhile, the racing in the front was rather quiet except for the lead change immediately after the start. With nothing noteworthy happened between the leaders after the opening lap, Muller won the 11 lap race to score his sixth fullmark of the season. The YOKOHAMA Trophy was won by Michelisz, for the second time this season, as his pursuers were busy to fight for positions between them.

For the standing start for Race 2, the top ten qualifiers were placed in reversed order of the grids and, therefore, Oriola sat on the pole position. He was followed by two front wheel drive car drivers, Menu and Monteiro in second and third respectively, and Weber was fourth in his rear wheel drive BMW which had theoretical advantage in a standing start.

When the signal blacked out and the field made getaway, however, Weber stalled his engine and his stranded car which caused a mess for the drivers behind him. But, fortunately, there was no serious accident and so the race went on.

Despite the turmoil behind him, Menu made a perfect start from the second grid just like the comic hero. He got into the inside of Oriola at the first corner and went through it as the race leader. Helped by better acceleration of his BMW at a standing start and Weber's mishap, Coronel moved up to third from the fifth grid and then overtook the young Spaniard at Turn 2. Now the Dutchman was running in second.

Tarquini displayed his fine race craft in the battle for fifth on the second lap of the race. Watching closely the battle between Monteiro and Michelisz from behind, the Italian didn't miss out the narrowest space on the inside of them at the end of back straight and squeezed his car into the space at the tight left hand corner. The move was successful and the veteran overtook the two cars at once!

Before getting over the shock from Tarquini's surprising move, Monteiro and Michelisz were now under fire of the two Chevrolet drivers' attack. And, despite their desperate resistance, Muller and Robert Huff got ahead of them by the last corner of the same lap.

On Lap 8, the Chevrolet duo caught Tarquini running in fourth and began their attack. After getting a tow of the Italian's SEAT on the pit straight, Muller and Huff made a move on him from the outside at Turn 1. Tarquini tried to defend by keeping the inside of the corner but he hit the curb too hard, which upset his car, and was forced to run wide.

Taking advantage of the opening, Muller promptly passed Tarquini but, when Huff was just following his teammate's path, the SEAT driver suddenly went sideways, so the Briton had no way to go and slightly hit the Tarquini's car. And this caused a chain collision between the Italian and Muller because the Frenchman was already under braking for the next corner, Turn 3, resulting in both drivers being thrown out of the track. When the dust settled, Huff was now ahead of Muller while Tarquini retired from the race at the end of the lap due to damages on his car.

At the front, Menu continued to drive on his own and neither Oriola nor Coronel was able to threaten him until the checkered flag fell. His victory in the Vaillant liveried car was a perfect gift to Philippe Graton, the son of the creator of the comic, who was present at the race meeting.

The winner of the YOKOHAMA Trophy class was Oriola who finished the race in second overall, after regaining the position from Coronel on Lap 3. With this result, the Spaniard stayed at the top of point standings when the championship concluded its European leg.