Tom Chilton praises team effort to score a “perfect win”

Sébastien Loeb Racing’s Tom Chilton dominated the opening race at Motegi to take his second victory of the season. The result allowed the Briton to overtake team-mate Mehdi Bennani in the drivers’ classification, and extended his lead in the independents’ category.

Chilton qualified in ninth position, and started from second for the opening race. As the lights went out, the Briton took the lead in his Citroen C-Elysée WTCC as pole-sitter Kevin Gleason slid wide at Turn 1 in his RC Motorsport Lada.

Chilton then led the entire race, winning with a 13-second margin over the second-placed Lada of Yann Ehrlacher, and also clocked the fastest lap of the race.

“The opening race was fantastic,” said Chilton. “We did a couple of tweaks to the car after qualifying and the circuit came to us perfectly, actually. I was just saying on the radio to the boys on the way round what a great job we’ve done with the chassis because I was so consistent, I can do the same tenth of a second every single lap because it’s so easy to drive.

“All credit goes to the team and the engineer. I really enjoyed driving the car. I kept thinking I should start lifting a bit but then I thought I quite fancied a watch,” added the Briton, who picked up a TAG Heuer watch due to setting the fastest lap of the day.

The SLR driver finished tenth overall in the main race, and fifth among the independents, ending the weekend fifth in the drivers’ championship, 44 points behind Volvo’s Thed Björk.

In the independents’ class, Chilton continues to lead, now up to 107 points, 2.5 ahead of Bennani and 12 ahead of Rob Huff.