Edoardo Mortara of Audi won the final race at Hockenheim. However, Marco Wittmann of BMW secured the championship with a fourth place by four points over Mortara.
BMW’s António Félix da Costa started the race on pole position and retained the lead at the start to Mercedes’ Gary Paffett who started in second place. The championship leader Marco Wittmann gained two positions on the first lap as he passed his BMW teammates Maxime Martin and Tom Blomqvist for the third place. The other title contender Edoardo Mortara had a poor start from sixth place alongside Wittmann, yet the Audi driver got up to fifth place behind Blomqvist on the first lap.
On the following lap Mortara overtook Blomqvist for the fourth place, to be running behind his title rival Wittmann. On lap 4, the race leader da Costa got hit by Paffett. Da Costa spun and fell down the order while Paffett became the new leader until he was give a drive-through penalty for the incident.
On lap 6, Mortara overtook Wittmann for the race lead, yet still not enough for the championship lead as all Wittman needed just a fifth place.
Mercedes’ Christian Vietoris was among the first to make his pit stop from fourth place on lap 12. That undercut allowed Vietoris to get past the BMWs ahead of him; Blomqvist pitted from third place on lap 20 and rejoined behind Vietoris.
The top two of Mortara and Wittmann stayed out past the halfway mark and pitted on lap 24. Mortara had built enough lead to rejoin ahead of those few who hadn’t pitted yet while Wittmann fell down to seventh place, behind the Audis of Mike Rockenfeller and Nico Müller, the Mercedes of Vietoris, the BMW of Blomqvist, and the Mercedes of Paul di Resta. Wittmann was still in a safe position for the championship as Rockenfeller and Müller still needed to pit and he was followed by his BMW teammates Maxime Martin and Timo Glock.
By lap 28, also Rockenfeller and Müller had pitted, promoting Wittmann into fifth place and the championship lead. While Mortara was leading and Vietoris running in second, Tom Blomqvist was struggling with grip. As Blomqvist was going down the order, di Resta climbed into third place and Wittmann into fourth.
Audi’s Edoardo Mortara won the race after 39 laps by 3.0 seconds to Mercedes’ Christian Vietoris. Mercedes’ Paul di Resta finished in third place, 4.2 seconds from Mortara. BMW’s Marco Wittmann in fourth place lost 5.0 seconds to Mortara, winning his second career DTM title over the Audi driver by four points.
