A dream start into the new DTM season. In bright sunshine and in front of packed grandstands, the 20 drivers staged a fascinating battle in the fight for the first pole position of the year. With 1:34.369 minutes, Canadian Mercedes-Benz-driver Bruno Spengler secured himself first place on the grid for tomorrow’s race (ARD live from 13.45 h) after three shoot-out sessions.
German Martin Tomczyk (Audi A4 DTM) followed in second place. 0.077 seconds down. The champion of the 2006 Formula 3 Euro Series, Paul di Resta from Scotland, finished in an impressive third place. In his first-ever DTM qualifying, the 21-year old newcomer put his AMG Mercedes C-Class from 2005 on the second row of the grid. For the first time in DTM history, a two-year old car made it into the final qualifying heat.
“Especially in the first qualifying of the season, being quickest is always something very special, as before that, nobody really knows where we are”, the pole sitter from the Hockenheimring said. For 23-year old Spengler, it was the third pole position for the DTM, for his employer, Mercedes-Benz, it was the 92nd. The 2004 DTM champion, Mattias Ekström (Audi), will be starting from fourth place on Sunday. Lining up behind him on the third grid row are his fellow Audi drivers Tom Kristensen from Denmark and German Timo Scheider. Crowd favourite Mika Häkkinen ended up in seventh place with his AMG Mercedes C-Class.
Daniel La Rosa was unlucky in qualifying. After having completed two sessions, the driver from Hanau had to park his car due to problems with the steering system and thus missed out on any better result. Susie Stoddart from Scotland however was happy. Twelfth place was her best-ever qualifying result in the DTM.
For reigning DTM champion Bernd Schneider and fellow Mercedes-Benz-driver Jamie Green, qualifying was over surprisingly soon. Both failed to make it into the final session of the shoot-out qualifying and will be starting from ninth and 13th place respectively.
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