Patel wins final race, finishes fourth in the championship

Heading into the final weekend of the championship, Patel's aim was to finish in the top five in the standings and a win in the final round allowed the Indian to achieve that.

As support race to 6 hours of Shanghai, the only LMS practice session saw leader Alex Yoong on top while Patel finished eighth.

In qualifying, Patel made it for the super pole session but a technical violation regarding his Cup's car ride height meant, he was to start from the second last row for the first race.

Maiden R8 LMS Cup win

The first race for Patel was a case of fighting his way up from the back of the field. While Yoong took the win from Cheng Congfu and Rahel Frey, Patel finished a gritty ninth.

In the process of finishing ninth, the Indian registered the fastest lap of 2m07.431s which gave him pole position for the final race of the season.

He didn't let go of the opportunity, starting alongside Yoong, Patel stormed off and stretched a comfortable lead over his rivals.

In the end, it was a cruise to claim his maiden win as he became the eighth different driver to win this season. Marchy Lee finished second, 1.276s off Patel while Congfu completed the podium.

"Starting from pole was great and I just kept looking ahead. I knew the guys behind me were fighting for the championship, so I just kept looking in front and never looked back," an elated Patel said after the race.

"However, with three laps to go I saw Marchy [Lee] catching me, which gave me a scare, but luckily I had saved some Push-to-Passes in case there was some need for damage control."

A sixth place finish was enough for Yoong to clinch the championship with 161 points, winning by just one point from Franky Cheng while Lee finished third with 134 points and Patel fourth with 119 points, in the the top five.