On 12th March at prime time (20:15hrs CET, 19:15hrs BT), in the popular German crime series ‘Alarm für Cobra 11 – die Autobahnpolizei, produced and brought by in the TV station RTL, DTM takes centre stage. The two chief characters, Semir and Alex, want to relax and opt for spending a weekend at the Nürburgring. Racing driver Bob Mayer (Barnaby Metschurat), a friend of Semir since they were little boys, can secure the DTM title by winning the Nürburgring round. But then, Mayer is suspected of murder and Semir is in problems. If he does his job, his friend will lose the race of his life. Things go haywire and turn into a life-or-death race.
A fictitious story, realised at a real venue. Parts of the shooting for the first of the eight episodes of the 26th ‘Alarm for Cobra 11’ season was executed in 2014, within the framework of the DTM round at the Nürburgring. The two chief characters, Erdogan Atalay and Vinzenz, caused a true stir in the paddock and used the chance of getting a taste of DTM. “DTM is great,” said Erdogan Atalay who plays the Cobra 11 hero Semir Gerkhan since episode one. “The atmosphere, the level of noise and the whole rigmarole. This kind of shooting always is something very special. First of all, the most people aren’t allowed to shoot in the DTM environment at all – and this applies even more to the paddock with all the racing cars for millions of Euros. It was a really wonderful shooting.” Vinzenz Kiefer, his colleague in ‘Alarm für Cobra 11, also was completely thrilled by DTM. “Due to the shooting we were in the thick of it,” he reveals. “I felt the roaring of the engines with every nerve of my body. This was pure madness! The Mercedes-Bez guys gave me a guided tour and showed me everything. I definitely will be there when DTM is back!”
The title ‘The last Race’ says is all – and this also applied to a Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG-Coupé that is involved in one of the spectacular stunts ‘Alarm für Cobra 11’ is so famous for. And former DTM driver and today’s DTM team co-owner Ralf Schumacher can be seen in a guest part.
In the 280 ‘Alarm für Cobra 11’ episodes to date, nearly 5,000 cars were wrecked, some 2.6 million blanks were fired and more than 1,000 gangsters were arrested. For the spectacular series, the production company, ‘action concept’ was awarded five ‘Taurus World Stunt Awards’ and eight times, it won the Action Oskar.