Further-down the leaderboard, Laurent Aiello ended up fourth for Opel, a second or so up on Manuel Reuter, in the second best placed Vectra GTS. It was Aiello's first top five finish of the season and followed his announcement on Saturday that he will retire from motor racing at the end of the year.
"This has been a great race, for me," said Aiello. "It was a strange feeling to know that today's race was the ante-penultimate one of my career. I made a slightly too conservative start as I didn't want to mess with Gary's business, and in the closing stages, I was involved in a great battle with Tom Kristensen."
Bruno Spengler and Heinz-Harald Frentzen meanwhile were sixth and seventh with the final points scoring position going to Jean Alesi. Frentzen and Alesi had a minor coming together near the end, something that cost them both a place.
"I wanted to pass Heinz-Harald Frentzen, but he braked earlier than on the previous lap, and when I tried to avoid him I went onto the grass. Then I slid and touched his car. The drive-through penalty cost me two positions. It's a shame, because my car was good and my team deserved a better result," stated the Frenchman.
Allan McNish and Martin Tomczyk completed the top ten, while Rinaldo Capello, Mika Hakkinen, Frank Stippler and Alex Margaritis were the only other classified finishers, in eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth and fourteen respectively.
"I'm disappointed because starting fourth I had expected more," said Hakkinen, who lost out following an incident with Christian Abt on lap 14.
"After Christian had hit my car, something was wrong and I was not able to push anymore," he added.
Of the rest, six drivers were not classified - most noticeably pole sitter, Jamie Green, who had to retire on lap 29 from 12th due to brake problems, while DTM old-hand, Bernd Schneider also went out after a tyre failure.
