Lausitz DTM: Molina sees off Green for Race 1 win

The Spaniard entered the Lausitzring weekend with just one point from the past four races to his name, but managed to add 25 to his tally despite having surrendered the lead on the opening lap.

Off the line, both Molina and Green were slower than third-placed BMW driver Marco Wittmann, but Wittmann could not find a way past and lost out to Robert Wickens instead - as the Audi duo up ahead entered Turn 1 side by side.

Green held the inside line and managed to stick alongside Molina through Turn 2 before finally edging ahead into Turn 3.

Yet the Spaniard, who had only converted one of his five past poles in the DTM into a win, was undeterred, keeping up with Green over the opening laps.

He stayed well within half a second of the race lead during the early stint, before lining up a DRS pass into Turn 1 on lap 8, with Green sticking to the outside to avoid contact.

From that point on, it was all Mortara, the Spaniard escaping out of Green's DRS reach with a fastest laptime of the race on lap 10 and continuing to edge ahead.

The gap would eventually stabilise between two and three seconds as Molina coasted to the chequered flag, while Green successfully held off Wickens to complete an Audi 1-2.

Having run Wickens close early on, Wittmann had to do with fourth place, withstanding massive pressure from first Lucas Auer and then Christian Vietoris.

And despite Wittmann missing out on the podium, the German has moved from fifth to first in the championship standings.

Vietoris settled for fifth, with Mattias Ekstrom passing Auer for sixth place and holding on to the spot.

It was eighth for Edoardo Mortara, ninth for Maxime Martin - the only driver to score in each of the five races of the season so far - and 10th for Nico Muller.

The only retirement of the race was Martin Tomczyk, hit by Esteban Ocon early on and having to nurse his severely crabbing car to the pits. Ocon was handed a drive-through for his role in the collision.

Race results

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time/Gap
1	Miguel Molina	Audi	42:04.244
2	Jamie Green	Audi	2.034
3	Robert Wickens	Mercedes	4.175
4	Marco Wittmann	BMW	8.724
5	Christian Vietoris	Mercedes	9.759
6	Mattias Ekstrom	Audi	10.398
7	Lucas Auer	Mercedes	10.794
8	Edoardo Mortara	Audi	14.437
9	Maxime Martin	BMW	17.808
10	Nico Muller	Audi	18.414
11	Bruno Spengler	BMW	18.965
12	Timo Glock	BMW	22.282
13	Paul di Resta	Mercedes	31.821
14	Gary Paffett	Mercedes	33.128
15	Antonio Felix da Costa	BMW	36.391
16	Maximilian Gotz	Mercedes	38.400
17	Timo Glock	Audi	39.396
18	Dani Juncadella	Mercedes	40.298
19	Mike Rockenfeller	Audi	41.509
20	Adrien Tambay	Audi	42.741
21	Augusto Farfus	BMW	43.286
22	Tom Blomqvist	BMW	43.912
23	Esteban Ocon	Mercedes	49.778
Ret	Martin Tomczyk	BMW