The Team Germany pairing of Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel took their third Nations Cup victory in a row at the Bird's Nest Stadium, coming through a tricky semi-final against USA before beating Great Britain in a close final.
It was Schumacher himself who won the decisive leg, beating former World Touring Car champion Andy Priaulx by just over a second to secure a 2-1 winning margin for Germany in the heats. Priaulx had forced the final run-off after comfortably triumphing over five-time GP winner Sebastian Vettel in the second heat of the final, with Vettel spinning his Ford Focus WRC into elimination while Priaulx was already in the lead.
Vettel joined his F1 title rival Jenson Button on the sidelines for the finale, after Button had lost a close-fought scrap in the first heat to Schumacher.
Germany had looked odds-on for their third Nations Cup win in a row right from the start of the day's action. In the new-for-2010 group stage, the German pair registered six wins out of six against China, Finland and Australia, securing their progress to the semi finals before the other three teams had a single heat win to their name.
China went through with the Germans from Group A, in a shock end to the heats that saw pre-event dark horses Finland eliminated. Former WRC and Race of Champions winner Marcus Gronholm lost all three of his group heats to see Finland join a cobbled-together Australian team in an early exit.
Team Great Britain had a similar easy time of it in Group B, trouncing the All-Stars team and Team Monaco to ensure that the final two heats between the pair of them were little more than dead rubbers. Button secured some personal bragging rights in the group stages as well, by winning against David Coulthard, who was racing for the All-Stars.
The final group, though, was a nailbiter, to the point that nobody seemed to know who had won even at the end of the heats. The teams from USA, France and Scandinavia all finished level on two points, but the USA pair of Travis Pastrana and Tanner Foust got the nod by having the quickest combined best times around the course.
The third group also took it's toll on the available machinery, with Scandinavia's Tom Kristensen planting a KTM XBow into the bridge at the crossover point, Pastrana ruining another XBox's gearbox, Guerlain Chicherit crashing a prototype Astra and Mattias Ekstrom breaking a second Astra's suspension over the jump.
In the semi-finals, Germany faced a huge challenge from the experienced rally types in the USA team, with Foust beating Schumacher and then Pastrana coming within a corner of knocking the reigning champions out, but he made a mistake at the final corner and Vettel took the win, going on to beat Foust in the decider.
In the second semi-final, Great Britain shattered the dreams of the home nation, with Button beating Ho-Pin Tung in a final heat decider after Tung had beaten Priaulx and Button had fended off Han Han, who was some sort of journalist.
But despite having the 2009 F1 champion on their side, Team GBR wasn't good enough to overcome the dominant force of Germany, who celebrated their third win in a row in the Nations Cup.
2009 Nations Cup Results.
Group A
| Pos | Team | Races | Wins |
| 1 | Germany* | 6 | 6 |
| 2 | China* | 6 | 4 |
| 3 | Finland | 6 | 2 |
| 4 | Australia | 6 | 1 |
Results
- Schumacher (2:00.012) beat Doohan (2:28.414)
- Vettel (1:59.381) beat Reed (2:05.807)
- Schumacher (2:03.192) beat Han (DNF)
- Vettel (1:55.951) beat Tung (1:58.345)
- Schumacher (2:00.636) beat Hirvonen (2:01.243)
- Vettel (1:56.085) beat Gronholm (2:01.587)
- Han (2:14.570) beat Doohan (2:48.088)
- Tung (1:58.537) beat Reed (2:01.505)
- Hirvonen (2:00.264) beat Doohan (2:05.545)
- Reed (1:58.841) beat Gronholm (1:59.787)
- Hirvonen (2:05.969) beat Han (2:05.969)
- Tung (2:04.234) beat Gronholm (2:05.180)
Group B
| Pos | Team | Races | Wins |
| 1 | Great Britain* | 4 | 4 |
| 2 | All Stars | 4 | 1 |
| 3 | Monaco | 4 | 1 |
Results
- Button (2:00.394) beat Coulthard (2:00.964)
- Priaulx (1:58.399) beat De Villiers (2:02.927)
- Button (1:59.109) beat Piccione (2:01.408)
- Priaulx (1:56.002) beat Pirro (1:57.466)
- Coulthard (1:58.824) beat Piccione (2:01.416)
- Pirro (1:58.607) beat De Villiers (1:59.515)
Group C
| Pos | Team | Races | Wins |
| 1 | United States* | 4 | 2 |
| 2 | Scandinavia | 4 | 2 |
| 3 | France | 4 | 2 |
Results
- Muller (2:00.635) beat Kristensen (DNF)
- Ekstrom (2:13.070) beat Chicherit (DNF)
- Foust (2:03.692) beat Kristensen (2:05.039)
- Muller (2:03.104) beat Foust (2:03.408)
- Ekstrom (2:05.213) beat Pastrana (2:05.776)
- Pastrana (2:05.603) beat Chicherit (2:09.708)
Semi-Finals
| Team Germany | 2 - 1 | Team United States |
| Schumacher | lost to | Foust |
| Vettel | beat | Pastrana |
| Vettel | beat | Foust |
| Team GBR | 2 - 1 | Team China |
| Button | beat | Han |
| Priaulx | lost to | Tung |
| Button | beat | Tung |
Final
| Team Germany | 2 - 1 | Team Great Britain |
| Schumacher | beat | Button |
| Vettel | lost to | Priaulx |
| Schumacher | beat | Priaulx |
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