Maro Engel wins first FIA GT World Cup behind safety car

Maro Engel in a Mercedes-Benz won the FIA GT World Cup after dominating the race from the beginning to the end. The German driver became the winner of the first edition of the FIA GT World Cup.
This was the second victory for the German driver in Macau, as in the previous edition he had won the GT race.
While the race was shortened from 18 to 16 laps due to a crash when the safety car was on the track the leadership of Engel was only threatened at the start. However, the German managed to keep in front of the pack to cross the finishing line in front of René Rast in the Audi and Stefan Mucke in the Aston Martin.
“It’s unbelievable and I’m so happy and proud to be the first winner.
I’m also very proud of my team because I made a huge mistake in qualifying [he crashed] and I thought that my weekend would be over.
Winning today is really amazing”, Engel said.
The end of the race was controversial as the German only managed to reach the podium position after the winner of the qualifying race, Stefan Mucke in the Aston Martin, hit Renger Van der Zande in his Mercedes, who at the time was lying second. After being hit, the Dutchman ended up being overtaken by Edoardo Mortara, René Rast and Stefan Mucke.
Although Mortara crossed the finish line in second he was later penalised for a false start with a 20-second penalty. This meant that Mr. Macau would finish the race in sixth position.
Local driver André Couto in the McLaren finished in the 11th position after starting at 20th. The Macanese, however, was one of the drivers involved in the crash behind the safety car that put an end to the race.
This was his second crash in two days, after hitting a wall in the qualifying session.