It was a masterclass from Rene Rast in the DTM to claim his fourth win of the 2019 season and extend his championship lead on Super Sunday on the full Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit last weekend.After starting from pole position in his Audi RS5 DTM, Rast intially dropped behind the similar fast starting machine of Loic Duval who sailed around the outside, whilst Robin Frijns just held onto third from Jamie Green.

Rast regained the lead with a sweeping manoeuvre on the run into Hawthorns later on the opening lap, and he never really looked back from there. Rast’s main title rival Nico Muller carved through the other Audis to move into second and began to Shadow Rast at the front, but was never really able to mount a challenge.

Green was eliminated from the frontrunning pack after being handed a five-second penalty for the positioning of his car on the starting grid, and he was also the first to pit from the leading group.

Rast circulated at the head of the field until the early middle section of the race when the majority of leading contenders began to take their mandatory pit stops.

Most of the field pitted before lap 14, but Philipp Eng remained out on track in his BMW M4, with Sheldon Van der Linde, just behind and the three Aston Martins of Paul Di Resta, Jake Dennis and Ferdinand von Habsburg.

Eng finally pitted from the lead on lap 22, and Rast was able to regain the lead shortly thereafter with Muller in hot pursuit. The Swiss pursuer was able to narrow the arrears down to under a second, but he never truly had an opportunity to ovetake the German and ultimately finished the race right in his wing mirrors with Frijns directly behind him.

Duval finished fourth after a hard fought defense against the charging Eng. The BMW ace made a superb pass on Mike Rockenfeller to move up to fifth but was unable to break into the top-four despite more than 10 laps of solid offense.

Rockenfeller kept touch with Eng to finish in sixth ahead of Sheldon Van der Linde’s BMW and Daniel Juncadella in the first of the Aston Martins. Jake Dennis charged through the pack in another Aston Martin to finish ninth after starting on the final row of the grid whilst Marco Wittmann completed the top-10 after winning yesterday.

Ex-F1 driver wound up 14th after a slow pit stop in his Aston Martin, whilst Green was the final Brit to finish in 15th following his penalty and a second pit stop.

Result
1, R Rast, Audi Sport Team Rosberg, Audi RS5 DTM, 42 laps
2, N Muller, Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline, Castrol EDGE Audi RS5 DTM, +0.240s
3, R Frijns, Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline, Aral Ultimate Audi RS5 DTM, +0.598s
4, L Duval, Audi Sport Team Phoenix, MASCOT WORKWEAR Audi RS5 DTM, +2.362s
5, P Eng,  BMW Team RMR, ZF BMW M4 DTM, +2.889s
6, M Rockenfeller, Audi Sport Team Phoenix, Akrapovic Audi RS5 DTM, +3.523s
7, S Van der Linde, BMW Team RBM, Shell BMW M4 DTM, +4.789s
8, D Juncadella, R-Motorsport 2, Aston Martin Vantage DTM, +5.229s
9, J Dennis, R-Motorsport 1, Aston Martin Vantage DTM, +6.193s
10, M Wittmann,  Team BMW RMG, Schaeffler BMW M4 DTM, +7.837s
11, F von Habsburg, R-Motorsport 2, Aston Martin Vantage DTM, +12.091s
12, T Glock, BMW Team RMR, JiVS BMW M4 DTM, +20.594s
13, J Aberdein, WRT Team Audi Sport, WRT Audi RS5 DTM, +27.882s
14, P Di Resta,  R-Motorsport 1, Aston Martin Vantage DTM, +35.392s
15, J Green, Audi Sport Team Rosberg, Hoffmann Group Audi RS5 DTM, +51.851s
16, P Fittipaldi, WRT Team Audi Sport, WRT Audi RS5 DTM, +55.065s
DNF, B Spengler, BMW Team RMG, BMW Bank M4 DTM
DNF, J Eriksson, BMW Team RBM, CATL BMW M4 DTM

DTM Standings
1, R Rast, 206pts
2, N Muller, 169pts
3, M Wittmann, 147pts
4, P Eng, 129pts

Images courtesy of www.pspimages.co.uk