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Tom Coronel clinched the Independents’ Trophy for the second time. The Dutchman and his SUNRED petrol-powered SEAT León achieved five race victories, two short of Félix Porteiro’s BMW, but scored points in 23 races out of 24.
Even more important were the points he collected thanks to the trophy’s new regulations that award three points for each point scored in the Drivers’ Championship. Coronel collected 45 points in this way, against Porteiro’s 30. And this made the difference as the final gap between them was 13 points.
Franz Engstler (2 victories) classified third from Stefano D’Aste (5 victories) who missed the last two races in Macau after his car was damaged during the qualifying. Tom Boardman (winner at Brands Hatch) and Kristian Poulsen completed the top-six.
A few other drivers proved to be competitive, although taking part in selected races. Morocco’s youngster Mehdi Bennani won his maiden race on his home race track at Marrakech, and so did experienced Frenchman Eric Cayrolle at Pau. Four others were able to achieve podium results: Laurent Cazenave at Pau, Philip Geipel at Oschersleben, Vito Postiglione at Brno, Seiji Ara at Okayama and Nobuteru Taniguchi at Macau.
A total of 30 drivers scored points, establishing a new record for the Independents’ Trophy.