Masterstroke: Patric Niederhauser and Kelvin van der Linde wrapped up the championship on Sunday with a second victory of the season, a result that was enough to secure the driver's title with two races to spare. The HCB-Rutronik Racing drivers crossed the finish line 5,158 seconds ahead of their nearest rival, the biggest winning margin of the year.

Record championship winners: Kelvin van der Linde becomes the second contestant in the history of the ADAC GT Masters to win the driver's title for a second time, his previous triumph having come in 2014. He shares the distinction with Sebastian Asch who was champion in 2012 and 2015.

Unbroken run: The title win for the Audi pairing continues a remarkable run of unsuccessful title defences in the ADAC GT Masters. Since the series was inaugurated in 2007, no-one has managed to win the championship two years running.

Title number two: RWT Racing won the Pirelli Trophy for the second time at Hockenheim. Switzerland's Remo Lips took the title with the Eberbach-based outfit in 2016. This year, it was the turn of Sven Barth.

Title dream turns into nightmare: Callaway Competition's home race could hardly have been a bigger disappointment for the team. Instead of delivering two strong results on their home track to close the gap at the top, Markus Pommer and Marvin Kirchhöfer's Corvette C7 GT3-R suffered major damage in both races as early as the first lap. An especially bitter pill to swallow as, following the crash at the start of the first race on Saturday, the team had worked through the night to rebuild the car, finishing at 7am on Sunday morning. Playing a key role in the repair job was Kirchhöfer's father, Uwe Baade.

Maiden pole: Audi driver Dennis Marschall, who claimed a first ever ADAC GT Masters pole position on Saturday, is the 78th driver in the series to book P1 on the grid.

Women drivers: 21-year-old Carrie Schreiner is the youngest ever female contestant to ascend the ADAC GT Masters podium. Fellow Audi driver Gosia Rdest was meanwhile making her debut at Hockenheim as only the eleventh woman to compete in the series.

Flying visit: Norbert Singer, long-serving engineer in the motorsport department at Porsche, called in on the Hockenheim race weekend.

Top marque: Van der Linde and Niederhauser registered win number 40 for Audi in the Super Sports Car League on Sunday. No other brand boasts as many successes in the series. The marque with the four rings is also ahead in terms of drivers' titles. The newly crowned champions were the fourth to win the title in an R8.

Most wins: Christian Engelhart's third win of the season achieved with partner Mirko Bortolotti on Saturday was his twelfth in the ADAC GT Masters, which puts him on level pegging with Luca Ludwig on the all-time leaderboard. Only Daniel Keilwitz has won more often in the series, namely on 22 occasions.

Unlucky contestant 1: Aust Motorsport's Maximilian Hackländer booked his team their best grid position of the season with a P10 on Saturday. But the number 3 Audi was then involved in the mass pile-up on the first lap of the race. The R8 LMS was so badly damaged that Hackländer and partner Christopher Dreyspring were unable to even start Sunday's race. "We have been jinxed this year," said team boss Frank Aust, ruing the loss of potential championship points. "We feel our car might have qualified even higher on Sunday."

Unlucky contestant 2: Audi driver Max Hofer arrived at Hockenheim as leader in the Pirelli Junior classification. The young Austrian then experienced a weekend to forget, dropping below team-mate Ricardo Feller to second place in the Junior classification with only the season finale at the Sachsenring remaining. Hofer was yet another victim of Saturday's pile up. Montaplast by Land-Motorsport rebuilt the Audi overnight at the company headquarters in Niederdreisbach, going so far as to replace the chassis. After a strong qualifying performance, Hofer and co-driver Christopher Mies were fifth in the Sunday race. "Unfortunately, we had a puncture five laps from the finish," explains Hofer. "We probably drove over a fragment of carbon fibre. That was really frustrating, because I was one of the fastest drivers in the second half of the race and could have gained one or two positions. But because we had to make the additional pit stop, we dropped back down the field and lost important points as a consequence."