Hockenheim DTM: Paffett crowned champion as Rast wins finale

In what was his employer Mercedes' farewell race in the category, Paffett secured his second title in DTM, 13 years after his first one in 2005, becoming the first champion from the Silver Arrows' stable since Pascal Wehrlein in 2015.

Rast had moved into the lead at the start and his victory never looked at risk as the Audi driver took a record sixth consecutive win in DTM.

However, all Paffett needed was a top-four finish and the Briton brought the car home in a comfortable third.

He spent the initial stages of the race behind Rast and pole-sitter Marco Wittmann and while he undercut the latter with an earlier stop, he did not fight for the position when the German fought back on fresher tyres.

However, Wittmann couldn't challenge the victorious Rast but still secured fourth in the standings with second place.

Paffett had a safe lead over fourth-placed Bruno Spengler when all the pitstops panned out and, while Audi had Nico Muller and Robin Frijns with superior pace in the late stages, both were too far to be a danger for Paffett.

Both Muller and Frijns got past Spengler for fourth and fifth respectively with only a handful of minutes remaining.

The rest of the pointscoring positions were taken by BMWs in the order of Spengler, Augusto Farfus, Philipp Eng, Joel Eriksson and Timo Glock, who had a warning during the race for forcing Frijns off track.

From 11th on the grid, Paul di Resta couldn't fight through to give himself a chance at the title, as an early-stop strategy eventually consigned him to 14th.

He even fell behind Rast in the standings, who ended up only four points shy of the title, despite being 93 adrift before his winning streak began.

Race results

Cla	Driver	Car	Laps	Time	Gap
1	René Rast	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'03.981
2	Marco Wittmann	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'07.767	3.786
3	Gary Paffett	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'19.819	15.838
4	Nico Müller	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'21.222	17.241
5	Robin Frijns	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'22.923	18.942
6	Bruno Spengler	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'24.985	21.004
7	Augusto Farfus	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'25.441	21.460
8	Philipp Eng	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'28.439	24.458
9	Joel Eriksson	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'32.664	28.683
10	Timo Glock	BMW M4 DTM	36	58'33.984	30.003
11	Mike Rockenfeller	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'37.387	33.406
12	Loic Duval	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'37.568	33.587
13	Edoardo Mortara	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'38.966	34.985
14	Paul di Resta	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'42.185	38.204
15	Daniel Juncadella	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'42.850	38.869
16	Lucas Auer	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'43.592	39.611
17	Jamie Green	Audi RS5 DTM	36	58'44.113	40.132
18	Pascal Wehrlein	Mercedes-AMG C63 DTM	36	58'48.619	44.638