Gary Paffett takes third win of the season as Mercedes claims the top four positions

Mercedes and Gary Paffett have continued their triumphant march in this year’s DTM, taking the victory in today’s Race 1 at Zandvoort, repeating their 1-2-3-4 from qualifying. Paul di Resta was second, followed by Lucas Auer and Pascal Wehrlein.

At the start, Paffett made his pole position count to take the lead ahead of Wehrlein and di Resta, with Audi’s Robin Frijns the only driver in the top ten to improve his position, overtaking BMW’s Marco Wittmann for sixth place.

Paffett was under pressure from Wehrlein at the top of the field. Auer fell behind, coming under attack from Frijns, who had taken fifth place from BMW driver Timo Glock.

Di Resta was the first of the leaders to pit at the end of lap six. Wehrlein pitted two laps later, with the Scot undercutting his team-mate for virtual second place. Paffett completed his tyre change on the following lap, leaving the pits ahead of di Resta.

Auer pitted from the race lead at the end of lap 14, leaving the pits just ahead of the Audis of Nico Müller and Frijns. The Swiss overtook the Austrian on the outside of Turn 4 with Auer getting is tyres into temperature just in time to defend from the Dutch’s attacks.

Audi driver René Rast was the only driver to not have pitted, leading the race and lapping faster than his pursuers, but his efforts to open a gap enough to cover a pit stop were ruined as the safety car was called into action on lap 18 as Müller had crashed against the barriers at Turn 3. The Swiss had a tyre failure as he had decided to wait a lap longer before taking his pit stop.

Duval and BMW’s Philipp Eng took the opportunity to change tyres, rejoining the pack at the back.

The race was restarted on lap 26, with Auer overtaking Wehrlein at Turn 1 to take fourth place. Positions remained the same until Rast entered the pitlane at the end of the penultimate lap and rejoined in 17th and last position.

Frijns was the best placed Audi in fifth, with the BMW contingent formed by Glock, Wittmann, Augusto Farfus and Joel Eriksson next. Audi’s Mike Rockenfeller completed the top ten.

Paffett has extended his lead in the championship to 127 points, 21 ahead of di Resta and 27 over Glock.

Action resumes tomorrow morning at 09:20 CEST with the third and final practice session.