The pinnacle of world touring car races, the FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC), reached its season's finale at Macau. After the curtain raiser at Curitiba, Brazil, the series toured around the world, including the first ever Japanese round in October, and displayed intense battles in every event.

The classic Macau Grand Prix has traditionally been the final round of the WTCC since the inception of the championship. The event attracts much attention from all over the world because the season long battle for the title is usually decided here. This year, more than 60,000 spectators visited the venue and the races were broadcast in 168 countries to a large number of motor sport fans.

The famous temporary street race track at Macau is incorporated onto the public streets of the city. As there are virtually no escape zones, it is extremely challenging for racers and this creates unpredictable races, though the track itself isn't so severe on tires.

In the final round, as many as 15 drivers carried the maximum amount of Success Ballast, 70kg, because the rule required eight non-regular participants, including Manabu Orido (Chevrolet) and Masaki Kano (BMW), to have the same weight as the drivers who had the heaviest ballasts in that round. Among non-regular Japanese drivers, however, Takayuki Aoki (BMW) had no ballast because the car he drove had been entered throughout the season by the Wiechers-Sport team which contended for Independent Trophy.

Alan Menu of Chevrolet got the pole position in the qualifying session. The Swiss driver scored a win at Macau last year and displayed his speed again, helped by a relatively lighter 44kg ballast. The second fastest driver was another winner from last year's event, Andy Priaulx of BMW Team UK, followed by the championship leader, Yvan Muller, in a SEAT Leon TDI.

The regular drivers of the manufacturer teams fully utilized the technique of slipstreaming with their teammates. James Thompson in a Honda Accord, the sole regular driver of the N.Technology team, looked in good form during the practice sessions but he struggled in the qualifying session and had to settle for eleventh.

After receiving careful maintenance work on Saturday, as there was no action on the track for them that day, the cars just sat on their grids for the final battles of the season. At the rolling start of Race 1 (the 23rd race of the series), the pole sitter, Menu, made a good start and went through the Lisboa corner, leading the pack. Priaulx and Rob Huff in a Chevrolet Lacetti followed but the former pulled away from the latter soon, so it looked like the race would become a duel between Menu and Priaulx.

The leading duo drove along the tight corners of the mountain section nearly touching the guard rails. Priaulx repeatedly tried to overtake Menu on the ocean side but a 26kg difference in ballast weight prevented him from passing Menu's lighter car.

The opportunities to overtake were limited in the nine lap race on the 6.117km street race track, which is the longest on the WTCC host circuit. Although their battle continued until they crossed the finish line, last year's winner of Race 1, Menu, managed to hold on to the top slot and score a pole-to-win. Yvan Muller finished in third and clinched the drivers' championship crown, as Gabriele Tarquini ended this race in seventh and lost his chance for the title. The reigning champion and the man who kept the crown for three seasons since the inception of the championship, Andy Priaulx, was finally deposed from the throne.

In the YOKOHAMA Independent Trophy class, Sergio Hernandez brought a win to the Proteam Motorsport team which was equipped with ADVAN brand alloy wheels.

After a one hour interval, the cars and drivers were ready for the season closer. As usual, the top eight finishers were placed on the grid in reverse order for the standing start of Race 2 and Thompson sat on the pole position. Helped by the Mugen tuned engine, his Accord, run by the N.Technology team, had remarkably been improved in its speed, so this could be an opportunity to achieve another good result.

Led by the Honda driver, everyone went through the Lisboa corner safely. Nicola Larini of Chevrolet rocketed to third from the ninth grid when the pack went into the mountain section but his leap was judged to be a result of a false start and he was given a drive through penalty for it.

On Lap 2, Andre Couto in another Accord crashed at Lisboa. Three other drivers, Jorg Muller, Tiago Monteiro and Jaap van Lagen, were also involved in the crash and all of them were forced to retire the race.

The battle for the top slot also heated up. Augusto Farfus in a BMW caught the tail of Thompson's Honda and they drove along tail-to-nose lap after lap. Then, on the penultimate lap, Farfus made a determined attack to Thompson resulting in contact between the two and sent the latter's car into the barrier.

The new race leader, Farfus, looked to secure the win but the final and biggest twist waited. On the final lap, a wheel of his BMW suddenly came off and he crashed his now three wheeled car! On top of this, Tarquini also ended his race in the barrier, after a desperate attempt to avoid hitting the loose wheel on the track.

As a result, the survival race in which only eleven cars out of 26 starters crossed the finish line was won by Rob Huff in a Chevrolet Lacetti which will be replaced by a new model, the Cruze, next season. So winning both races at Macau was a successful conclusion for their outgoing Lacettis.

"This track isn't so severe for tires, compared with ordinary permanent circuits, because the surface is rather flat and less abrasive for tire treads. And there are no long corners where tires have to bear a continuous load. But, in comparison with the other street circuit at Pau, this track has no curbs and the speed range is higher than the French counterpart.
"For the events in Europe, we supply three sets of new tires for each car per event and teams are allowed to use two sets of used tires they bring. But, for the fly away events like Macau, we supply four sets of new tires for each car.
"We thought SEATs would be fast in the high speed section on the ocean side because of their power output and Schnitzer's BMWs would have the advantage on the mountain side because they had a lot of set up data. But eventually, Chevrolet won both races.
"Though an unexpected incident happened at the end of Race 2, we are quite satisfied that we were able to support these spectacular races."