Marco Wittmann claimed a sensational victory in Misano's race one ahead of Rene Rast and Loic Duval.
The double champion was forced to start from the back of the grid after failing to set a laptime in qualifying. The BMW driver then pitted on lap one, allowing him to quickly charge up the field after Joel Eriksson came to a halt on lap 3, bringing out the Safety Car.
After the restart, Wittmann quickly rose up the order on new tyres and inherited the lead after the leaders came in for their pitstops around lap 15. Wittmann then managed to keep a comfortable gap back to the chasing Rast to take a remarkable victory.
Behind Duval, Bruno Spengler and Nico Müller completed the top five ahead of Mike Rockenfeller, Philipp Eng and Jonathan Aberdein. The South African started on the front row, but struggled in the race, resulting in an eighth place finish.
The top ten was rounded out by Sheldon van der Linde and Timo Glock, with MotoGP's Andrea Dovizisio finishing a credible twelfth on his DTM debut.
The finishing order was completed by Daniel Juncadella, Ferdinand Habsburg, Jake Dennis and Robin Frijns, who spent most of the race in the garage with a technical issue.
Paul di Resta was the only other retirement.
