How BMW's "scary" performance led to DTM Nurburgring 1-2

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12 hours ago

BMW dominated the second Nurburgring DTM race with Rene Rast taking victory ahead of Schubert team-mate Marco Wittmann, as its rivals had no answer to its performance: 'It was a bit scary with the top speed machines I had around me,' smiled third-placed Landgraf Mercedes driver Lucas Auer.
The DTM leader started from second but had to admit defeat to Rast after just four laps: 'I saw Rene, he was closing in so quickly. So, I defended once and then the second time he basically just overtook me fair and square.'
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Rast and BMW's overall performance took most by surprise – including the driver himself.
'I don't know [where the performance came from], to be honest. If I knew, we would do the same every race,' Rast said. 'But I could already feel in the formation lap that the car was connected like it has never been before on this track this weekend.
'So I went for the attack. I passed five cars in the first couple of laps and still pulled away, which was even surprising to me. I was hoping for a podium, but I wasn't expecting a victory - and such a dominant one as well.'
However, Wittmann was unsure why he was not able to make equally-strong progress in the first stint: 'Somehow I struggled with tyre performance and couldn't really keep up with the leading group.'
Marco Wittmann, Schubert Motorsport BMW M4 GT3
But team boss Torsten Schubert had an explanation. 'It was simply due to his position, because Marco was stuck in traffic. He always had cars in front of him, and when you can't drive freely, you naturally have a problem,' he told Motorsport.com's sister website Motorsport-Total.com.
'Otherwise, they were already doing well in terms of pace, and Marco also said that he had a great car. It depends on the situation. When you're stuck behind someone for a few laps and have to try to fight your way past, it's not that easy.'
'That was also the main reason why we decided to stop early to put on the second set [of tyres],' added Wittmann, alluding to his strategy, as he undercut several drivers and moved up to third, directly behind Auer. 'In the end, the gap was slightly too big, because once I was close to him [Auer], his tyres were warm already. So I knew there was only a chance maybe at the second pitstop, although he opened up the gap.'
But the BMW driver was gifted second place when Auer got held up in his second pitstop due to a problem with his Mercedes.
Out in front, Rast had already built up a lead of almost 10 seconds, which was not only due to the favorable Balance of Performance, but also down to an incident on Saturday.
In the accident that caused the first race to be red-flagged, Rast had damaged both front rims in a collision with Mirko Bortolotti's Abt Lamborghini.
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'We had several broken rims yesterday and were allowed to take the set of tyres from free practice during the red flag,' team boss Schubert explained. 'The regulations allow this set to be used in such cases. We were able to save the tyres, only the rims were damaged.'
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It meant that the two undamaged front tyres, which Rast was allowed to change during Saturday's interruption, were remounted on intact rims overnight and available again to be used on Sunday.
'That was certainly an advantage for the race today. It meant we could put a very good set of tyres on Rene's car. And you could see that Gounon and Engel also had new tyres from yesterday, but when you're stuck in traffic, there's nothing you can do,' Schubert concluded.
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