The FIA World Touring Car Championship series has been in the season's middle segment that mainly consists of European rounds. Taking a week off after the back to back race meetings in Slovakia and Hungary, the championship now came to Austria to run the fifth round of the season at Salzburgring.

For the series, this was the only second visit to the Austrian race track in as many years. The track layout is distinctive and it looks like a walking stick with a handle, if you see it on a bird's eye plan. It may look quite easy to drive around the track but it is undulating and the corners on both ends have steep cants. The drivers have to carry as much speed as possible into these corners after the high speed sections, tuning into them still under braking. The corner before the last S bends has the steepest cant and becomes tighter on the exit.

The long back stretch slightly bends in fact, so the cars run through it in very high speeds with the front wheels not in the straight position. Because of these conditions, Salzburgring is known as one of the toughest race tracks for tires, among the WTCC hosting venues.

During last year's meeting when the WTCC teams had visited here for the first time, some of the front wheel drive car pilots had damaged or used up their front tires after their hard fighting to the extent that it had certainly affected the final results of races. Therefore, the teams and drivers knew the tire management during the races would be crucial.

According to the championship's Compensation Weight rules, both Chevrolet Cruze and Honda Civic were given a 40kg handicap in this round, while SEAT Leon had to carry a 20kg weight on top of the standard minimum weight. For BMW 320 TC, there was no additional weight and Lada Granta from Russia was allowed to run 20kg lighter than the German car. Taking the severity on tires that this particular race track imposed into account, many thought the BMW drivers might have an advantage because the rear wheel drive cars tended to eat their tires more evenly and 40kg lighter than Chevrolet or Honda.

Once the practice sessions got underway, however, the dominant force was the American marque. Yvan Muller stayed on the top of the time sheet throughout the sessions, followed by the other Chevrolet drivers, while Robert Huff's effort in his SEAT Leon put him in second in the second session.

The trend didn't change in the qualifying session. Being led by Tom Chilton, the Chevrolet drivers took the top four slots in Q1. Then in Q2 competed by the top 12 drivers in the previous section, Muller set 1'25”756 which was the fastest of all and 1.6 seconds faster than his own pole position time last year. He was followed by his teammate Chilton and, with Huff being the only exception, the top five was rounded out by the Chevrolet drivers, as Alex MacDowall and Michel Nykjaer came in fourth and fifth respectively.

However, this order didn't simply decide the starting grids because the Stewards of the meeting imposed the grid penalties to as many as 14 drivers for their “unnecessary slow driving” for seeking opportunities to use other car's tow in the qualifying session which the Stewards considered as “unsporting behavior on the track.” As a result, the starting grid order had a major reshuffling and the pole position was given to Nykjaer with James Nash taking the second gird, which meant the YOKOHAMA Trophy contenders sat on the front row.

Under the slightly overcast sky, Race 1 began. The weather was a little cooler than that of last year's meeting with air/surface temperatures at 26/33 degrees Celsius. After the field completed a rolling lap, Nash looked to make a better start and tried to get abreast of the pole sitting Nykjaer. But the Dane held the inside at the first corner and went through it as the leader.

Behind them, however, the championship leaders already began to fight back from the wrong end of the grids and to threaten the drivers who usually were running in the mid field. Starting from the 13th grid, Muller was already in sixth when he completed Lap 3, for example.

At the front, Nash closely followed the race leader, watching for the opportunity to pass him. Along with the top two, Mehdi Bennani in the Proteam Racing run BMW was in third after starting from the third grid and became the rear guard of the leading pack.

On Lap 5, the fight for fourth between Fredy Barth in the Wiechers-Sport run BMW and MacDowall ? starting from the fifth and 12th grids respectively ? became even hotter and, after making physical contact, the Chevrolet driver got ahead of the Swiss. But Muller lay in wait to take every opportunity behind them. And when MacDowall ran slightly wide at Turn 2 on the next lap, the Frenchman passed both Barth and MacDowall in one move. Muller was now in fourth, only one place shy of a podium finish.

While the battles between the leading drivers intensified in the closing phase, there was a multi-car accident on Lap 10. Charles Ng Ka Ki and Franz Engstler, both driving a BMW, made contact and then they were heavily hit by Darryl O'Young who was following them close behind. Unfortunately, the damage to their cars was too bad to continue, so they ended the race on the spot.

As the halted cars didn't block the track, the Safety Car wasn't required to come out but the yellow flags were shown for the affected sections. Therefore, no overtaking was allowed in those sections.

But it didn't stop Muller's pursuit and he managed to pass Bennani on Lap 11 to move up to third. Nash also put heavy pressure on Nykjaer by weaving his car closely behind the leader's Chevrolet but the Dane wasn't shaken up and kept the lead position until he crossed the finish line. This was his second victory of the season since the Moroccan round in April. Nash finished the race in second, which meant the YOKOHAMA Trophy contenders made a 1-2 in overall result.

Partly because of rather short interval between races, four cars were absent from the starting grids for Race 2 due to the damage from accidents in the first race. On the reversed order grids on which the above mentioned penalties weren't imposed, Nash, the runner-up of Race 1, sat on the pole position alongside of Norbert Michelisz in a Honda Civic on the second grid. Then Pepe Oriola was placed on the third grid, followed by the factory Honda pair, Tiago Monteiro and Gabriele Tarquini in fourth and fifth.

When the red signals went out, Michelisz reacted to it faster than his mail rivals did and got ahead of Nash for a while. But the pole sitter got better acceleration after the car left the grid, so he soon regained the lead position.

Starting from the tenth grid, Muller was in hot pursuit, just as he did in the first race. He was already in fourth on Lap 5 by overtaking Huff, Tarquini and others without difficulty and, three laps later, the Frenchman passed Monteiro to move up to third.

The race leading Nash kept fending off Michelisz's attack and the Hungarian was now under Muller's pressure in the closing stage of the race. On the penultimate lap of the 12 lap race, Muller overtook Michelisz and, now running in second, tried to better his position one more but the time was running out for him. Keeping one and a half second gap with Muller, Nash completed the final lap and claimed his maiden WTCC overall victory. Thus, the Austrian round saw YOKOHAMA Trophy class drivers scored overall wins in both races.

Salzburgring is known as one of the toughest race track in terms of the severity to tires, among the WTCC hosting venues. Keeping last year's experience in mind, the teams were preparing for the race with consideration for the tire management more than usual. Yokohama Tire also provided useful information relating to the tire pressure or suspension set up etc. to the teams as a precaution. The leading teams, especially those running the front wheel drive cars, were keen to consult with the tire servicing staff about the conditions of tires they used in the free practice session, taking them to the Yokohama's garage.

The battles on the track were fiercer than those of last year's meeting, partly because not a few leading drivers were forced to start the race from lower positions after the imposition of grid penalties. But there was no tire-induced problem at all during the two races. Although the latest WTCC cars with 1600cc turbo engines have stronger driving torque, and the faster cars were now running with heavy compensation weights on board, the superb performance of tires supplied by Yokohama helped the teams and drivers providing a good show of racing throughout the day.