Bruno Spengler eased to a 'lights to flag' Nurburgring victory moving him into second position in the standings and handing BMW their second
DTM victory of the season.
Spengler, who started from pole position, made a faultless getaway and immediately distanced himself away from the chasing pack.
The Canadian never looked like relinquishing his lead in either of the pitstop phases and went on to take his second win of the year by 6.7 seconds.
Spengler now lies just 20 points behind championship leader Gary Paffett who finished today's race in sixth.
The second spot on the rostrum was also claimed with relative ease. Audi's Edoardo Mortara, like Spengler, was able to pull away from his nearest challengers after successfully keeping his Audi team mate Mike Rockenfeller at bay up until the first round of stops.
Rockenfeller had looked favourite to complete the podium, but the fast charging BMW of Martin Tomczyk passed the Phoenix Audi just after the pairs opening stop and clinched third position to remain in contention to defend his championship.
The Phoenix man was then demoted to fifth thanks to the clever strategy of Jamie Green who stopped for the final time earlier than most in a bid to pump in a series of fast laps in clean air. Green only missed out on leapfrogging Tomczyk by a mere few tenths.
Paffett's sixth position ensured he picked up an important handful of points, further protecting his championship lead on track where Mercedes seemed to struggle all weekend.
Robert Wickens, who initially held sixth before Paffett caught the Canadian napping after his first pitstop, held on to a career best seventh ahead of the Audi pair of Filipe Albuquerque and Timo Scheider who finished eighth and ninth.
BMW's Augusto rounded off the points paying positions in tenth place.
The remaining British hopefuls endured a miserable day as Andy Priaulx's chance of picking up points quickly fizzled out after being unceremoniously spun around by Christian Vietoris while David Coulthard limped home to last place following a lengthy spin.
Susie Wolff also unfortunately found her Mercedes pointing in the wrong direction after contact involving Coulthard and Robert Mehri took the innocent Wolff out of contention.
by Simon Evans