Bromley-born Gary Paffett delighted the local support with third position as the DTM series arrived at Brands Hatch on Sunday – only to lose his podium place post-race.

Audi’s Mike Rockenfeller took a lights-to-flag victory by seven seconds over Bruno Spengler (BMW) as Paffett, who qualified in 12th place, carved his way through the field thanks to some well-timed pit stops and good use of tyres.

The McLaren-Mercedes F1 test driver, cheered on by team-mate Jenson Button, narrowly missed out on a podium last time out at Hockenheim but appeared to have made amends when he kept the chasing pack behind.

He was, however, penalised for not slowing down enough under yellow flags and his lead over fourth, fifth and sixth-placed drivers Robert Wickens, Marco Wittmann and Joey Hand was not enough to keep third once a five-second penalty was added. He was classified sixth.

Paffett said: "I came off the accelerator when the yellow flags were out, but how am I expected to lose half a second inside 10 seconds? I hope that the points we lost today because of this penalty don’t make all the difference at the end of the season."

The next round of the series is at Spielberg, Austria, in two weeks.

Picture: Peter Still