Malaysia's Karamjit Singh has sealed a third FIA Asia Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) title after the provisional results of the Rally of China were upheld yesterday.

The clerk of course for the Rally of China confirmed the results with no changes to the top three finishers. And Karamjit and his co-driver, Alleh Oh, had reasons to cheer the second-place finish behind Japan’s Taguchi Katsuhiko in the fifth and penultimate round of the APRC.

The 42-year-old Karamjit took his total in the overall standings to 59 points. He holds an 11-point lead over Armin Kremer of Germany. Kremer, a former European rally champion, was the fastest in the second leg of the Rally of China but was placed third in the round.

While Kremer picked up 10 points, his hopes of winning a second successive APRC title are over.

Karamjit, in a telephone interview from China, said the organisers had confirmed that he had won the APRC title with one round to spare in India on Dec 4-5.

“Under the championship rules, the final classification will be taken from the best five out of six rounds,” he said. “If Kremer goes on to win in India and gets the maximum of 16 points and I get none, he still cannot beat me to the title.

“Dropped scores will come into account after the final round in India. Should Kremer take full points, he will have to discard the five points from the fourth round in Japan, leaving him only 11 points to add to his current total. He will tie the score with me but I will still take the title on a tie-break situation.”

Karamjit has the superior record over Kremer in the five rounds thus far. He won his first APRC overall title in 2001 and retained it the following year, where he also won the production car title in the world championships. But he lost the APRC title to Kremer by just a one point last year.

“We are happy to have achieved our objectives here. The result in China played into our hands and I am now looking ahead to receiving my overall trophies in Monaco during the FIA Champions of the World dinner in December.”

Karamjit said he would still go all out to win the final round in India.

“I want to win the title by a clear margin in India. We are lucky to get some sponsorship from JK Tyres of India. It will be a fitting end to our season to get a good result for them there,” he said.

Official race results of the China Rally: 1. Taguchi Katsuhiko-Mark Stacey (Jpn-Aus) Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 8 2'08:59.9, 2. Karamjit Singh-Allen Oh (Mas) Proton Pert 2'09:16.3, 3. Armin Kremer-Timo Gottschalk (Ger) Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 8 2'10:09.9, 4. Yanagisawa Hiroshi-Ideue Tatsuya (Jpn) Subaru Impreza 2'12:31.3, 5. Geof Argyle-Steve Smith (Nzl) Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 8 2'14:15.7.