HWA Mercedes racer Gary Paffett stormed to his first DTM victory of the season at the Lausitzring on Sunday, ahead of Mike Rockenfeller and Christian Vietoris.
Starting 2nd, Paffett led poleman Vietoris by the first turn, soon building a three-second lead by the first scheduled stops, eventually emerging ahead of the early stopping Rockenfeller.
From there, Paffett proceeded to build a gap over the chasing pack, before taking the chequered flag just under seven seconds ahead of Rockenfeller, making it four different winners from four races.
For the Audi man, 2nd place brings Rockenfeller to the top of the points standings, joint level on points with reigning champion Bruno Spengler. Running 6th early on, an off-kilter pit strategy helped to promote Rockenfeller up to 3rd, slotting in between the hard charging Robert Wickens and Vietoris, before Rockenfeller passed Wickens.
Where Rockenfeller exacted a lengthy stint on the harder compound tyres, Wickens began to fall back somewhat in the later tours, allowing Vietoris to catch and pass for the final podium place late on.
Behind the leading quartet Jamie Green assumed 5th, garnering a healthy gap over the chasing trio of Daniel Juncadella (6th, a superb effort from 13th), Spengler (7th) and Mattias Ekstrom. Indeed Ekstrom was making waves in the final laps thanks to moves on Adrien Tambay, Pascal Wehrlein and Edoardo Mortara.
Both Tambay and Wehrlein would fall back late on, promoting Mortara to 9th and Roberto Merhi to 10th.
2013 DTM Round of Lausitzring (Rd 4, June 16th; 52 laps) Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Gary Paffett HWA Mercedes 1h09m58.562s 2. Mike Rockenfeller Phoenix Audi +6.800s 3. Christian Vietoris HWA Mercedes +11.510s 4. Robert Wickens HWA Mercedes +12.790s 5. Jamie Green Abt Audi +14.138s 6. Daniel Juncadella Mucke Mercedes +19.462s 7. Bruno Spengler Schnitzer BMW +21.592s 8. Mattias Ekstrom Abt Audi +21.621s 9. Edoardo Mortara Rosberg Audi +24.715s 10. Roberto Merhi HWA Mercedes +25.643s 11. Adrien Tambay Abt Audi +27.968s 12. Augusto Farfus RBM BMW +34.178s 13. Dirk Werner Schnitzer BMW +38.000s 14. Timo Glock MTEK BMW +49.305s 15. Joey Hand RBM BMW +53.321s 16. Miguel Molina Phoenix Audi +58.882s 17. Pascal Wehrlein Mucke Mercedes +59.948s 18. Filipe Albuquerque Rosberg Audi +1m03.083s 19. Martin Tomczyk RMG BMW +1m03.107s 20. Timo Scheider Abt Audi +1m08.006s 21. Marco Wittmann MTEK BMW +1 lap 22. Andy Priaulx RMG BMW +1 lap
