Finale facts and figures: ADAC GT Masters in Hockenheim

• Hockenheim – venue for ADAC GT Masters finale for fifth time
• Home race for a number of teams and drivers
• Drivers’, team and Gentlemen categories to be decided at finale

Hockenheim. Excitement and high drama at its best. Previous ADAC GT Masters finales in Hockenheim have delivered plenty of spectacular racing and gripping motorsport action in recent years. Once again this year, titles will be decided in the drivers’, team and Gentlemen categories of the ADAC GT Masters in this weekend’s two final races (Saturday and Sunday, live on kabel eins, commencing at 11:45 am). Here are the most important facts and figures concerning the Super Sports Car League finale at the Formula 1 circuit in south-west Germany:

- This year marks the fifth time that the ADAC GT Masters champion has been crowned in Hockenheim. The Motodrom is the venue for the final two races for the fourth consecutive year.

- Championship leaders Kelvin van der Linde and René Rast have a 35-point lead in the Audi R8 in the run-up to the finale. In the past seven years, no one in the history of the ADAC GT Masters has ever had a more comfortable lead as they make their way to the final two races.

- Suspense until the very end. The title has only ever been decided twice in the penultimate race. In their battle for the title, the new champions have had to fight until the final minute of the racing season five times in all.

- Heading the rankings before the finale means your half-way there in the battle for the title. Only once in seven years has the lead in the standings changed during the final weekend.

- Teams fielding an Audi, Porsche and BMW are contesting the title in 2014. All three manufacturers also had title chances ahead of the finale last year. For the third year in a row, Porsche are battling out in the finale to secure their second drivers’ title since 2008. Audi drivers have a chance of lifting the title for the fourth time in five years.

- Championship leaders René Rast and BMW duo Claudia Hürtgen and Dominik Baumann are tried and tested in battling for the ADAC GT Masters title. In the past, all three drivers have already had their chance of clinching the championship in the finale.

- In previous years, the Hockenheimring has especially suited mid-engine sports car. Eight out of twelve victories in the ADAC GT Masters at Hockenheim were achieved by super sports car with a mid-engine configuration, running a naturally aspirated V8 or V10 engine, as in the Audi R8, the Ferrari F430 or the Ford GT.

- Audi is the most successful marque in the ADAC GT Masters at Hockenheim. The supercar built by Quattro GmbH in Heilbronn-Biberach has notched up three race wins in Hockenheim.

- Along with the Slovakia Ring and the Red Bull Ring, the Hockenheimring is one of the fastest circuits on the ADAC GT Masters calendar.

- With a lap time of 1:39.650 mins, Porsche driver Martin Ragginger has held the qualifying record in the ADAC GT Masters at the 4.5 km grand prix circuit since 2012. Frank Kechele holds the lap record for a Ford GT – 1:40.418 mins.

- The highest top speeds of the season are always recorded at Hockenheim. The ADAC GT Masters supercars can touch speeds reaching 270 km/h on the fastest part of the circuit, the Parabolica.

- All three teams whose drivers are fighting for the championship title in Hockenheim also still have a chance of winning the team standings. The feat of securing a double victory in both drivers’ and team standings has only been achieved twice, in 2007, with Reiter Engineering and Christopher Haase in the Lamborghini Gallardo, and in 2012, with Sebastian Asch/Maximilian Götz and MS Racing at the wheel of the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG.

- So far, only twice has anyone ever secured the title with only one race win to their name. In 2011 at Hockenheim, Alexandros Margaritis and Dino Lunardi drove to victory in the BMW ALPINA B6 to secure the championship. The following year, Maximilian Götz and Sebastian Asch succeeded in the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG.

- In the previous seven years of the ADAC GT Masters, no champion has successfully managed to defend his title. Nothing will change in that respect in 2014, because Diego Alessi and Daniel Keilwitz, who were champions last year in the Corvette, are out of title contention in the finale.

- The finale is also a home race for many teams and drivers in the ADAC GT Masters. Callaway Competition (Leingarten), ROWE Racing (Worms), GW IT Racing Team Schütz Motorsport (Bobenheim-Roxheim), RWT Racing Team (Eberbach), René Rast (Frankfurt), Nico Bastian (Frankfurt), Andreas Wirth (Heidelberg), David Jahn (Speyer), Sven Barth (Weinheim) and Jens Klingman (Leimen) are all based very close to Hockenheim.

- None of the title contenders already holds an ADAC GT Masters title, but the list of drivers with championship wins in other series is very long. The title contenders have taken wins in a number of other series, including the Porsche Supercup and the Porsche Carrera Cup (René Rast), the FIA GT3 European Championship (Dominik Baumann), the Endurance Championship at the Nürburgring (Claudia Hürtgen), the Renault Mégane Eurocup (Jaap van Lagen) and the Volkswagen Scirocco R Cup (Kelvin van der Linde).