It did not take long for the championship to take a twist though when Andy Priaulx curiously lost the rear-end of his BMW under braking into the first corner, the 320si swapping sides and bouncing backwards across the grass and back onto the circuit, duly clipping arch-rival James Thompson in the process and being tagged by the hapless Luca Rangoni. Still, while the independent Italian managed to continue, both Priaulx and Thompson plummeted down the order and well out of the points.
Up at the front, most eyes were on a thrilling battle for fourth place between an exceptionally defensive Yvan Muller and Huisman, with the BMW continuously darting up alongside the clearly slower SEAT, but being unable to achieve anything more than the odd nudge through the bends.
Allowing the following BMWs of Jorg and Dirk Muller to duly close on the battle, Huisman finally dived up the inside of Muller at the end of the third lap, only for the Frenchman to slip back up the inside on the first turn. However, the move was not over and Muller defended his position by nudging Huisman onto the grass around the sweeping right-hander up to turn three, the Dutchman dropping behind his BMW team-mates as a result.
Amidst all the changes for position though, Dirk Muller vaulted past Yvan up to fourth place, but when Jorg attempted to follow him through at turn seven, a brief bit of contact into the corner broke the suspension on the
BMW, forcing him to go straight on at the exit of the corner and collect the Leon on the outside. Jorg would limp back to the pits to retire, while a rather battered and bruised Yvan Muller slipped out the top ten - another two championship contenders had fallen by the wayside…
Seemingly taking tips from those in front of them, it was the turn of those disputing what was now eighth place and pole position for race two, to show their racing credentials, with a frenetic battle breaking out between a Augusto Farfus, Salvatore Tavano, Gianni Morbidelli, Peter Terting, Jordi Gene, Luca Rangoni, Tom Coronel and Pierre-Yves Corthals.
