In front of a record 73,000 crowd, Ekstrom led away at the restart with teammate Tomczyk tucking in behind him. Albers had a great start to pass Paffett, Bernd Schneider and Emanuele Pirro to slot into third but despite harrying Tomczyk throughout the sprint, he was unable to take the place and had to settle for third place.
However he wasn’t too downhearted having started down the order.
“It was yet another fantastic home race for me,” he said. “The atmosphere and the amount of fans were even better than last year. It’s just great to be supported by the spectators. I’m pleased for the fans that I drove onto the podium despite starting in seventh position.”
Paffett also made his way up the order, his fourth place finish enough to ensure that he heads to the penultimate round at Brno with a chance of taking the title – albeit a slight one, the gap to Ekstrom now 16 points.
However fifth place was not enough to keep Schneider in the title hunt although he was focusing on his Mercedes teammates afterwards.
"A turbulent race,” he said. “After quite a good qualifying result I had expected more for today. However, it's important that Christijan and Gary still have a theoretical chance of the title."
Behind Schneider, Tom Kristensen and Pirro took sixth and seventh, with Manuel Reuter the top Opel finisher in eighth.
He was disappointed with the result, and also with the regulations that saw the restart decided by the positions two laps earlier, meaning he was eighth for the restart instead of sixth, the position he was in when Dumbreck crashed.
“I’m not satisfied with my result today as a finish in the top five would have been realistic,” he said. “We were competitive. From a sporting point of view it’s frustrating that I was in sixth position before the race was stopped, but that I was pushed two places back in the restart due to regulations.”
But the day belonged to Ekstrom, who can now clinch the title in the Czech Republic if results go his way.
“This is a great day for me,” he said. “My car was just perfect, my first start brilliant and I absolutely controlled the race until it was stopped due to the accident. It was a bit harder after the new start. A new start always harbours a new risk, but everything went perfectly.
