Motorsports Mondial

 

Photo: DTMmedia

MikeRockenfeller claims maiden DTM pole in Great Britain.

Fawkham. Fawkham. A relief for the DTM fans. The four weeks’ summer break is over and Audi driver Mike Rockenfeller got the first applause. The 27-year old German outpaced the opposition in qualifying for the seventh DTM season round at Brands Hatch (GB) and will be starting from pole position on Sunday. “I am really happy, because I hadn’t expected this. We picked the right strategy, we gambled a little bit and thus had fresher tyres for the final heat. We are well prepared for the race”, said the fastest man of the day. ’Rocky’ completed his lap of the 1.929 kilometres short circuit, the shortest on the DTM calendar, in 42.090 seconds and thus ended up ahead of Mercedes-Benz driver Gary Paffett, who was second (42.288 seconds). For Rockenfeller, it is the maiden pole of his DTM career. For Audi, it is the first pole at Brands since 2008.

Paffett commented after his thrilling duel with Rockenfeller: “Here, it is always very close. The track is really short and one has to be 100 percent committed. I am happy to have made it into second place, particularly in front of my fans here in Great Britain.”

German Martin Tomczyk was also happy. With his 2008-spec Audi A4 DTM, he claimed third place on the grid. With his AMG Mercedes C-Class in fourth place, Jamie Green will be lining up alongside the runner-up in the drivers’ standings. Swede Mattias Ekström (Audi) will be starting from fifth place.

Points’ leader Bruno Spengler was twice unhappy in the battle for the starting grid positions. In sixth place, the Canadian Mercedes-Benz driver failed to make it into the final heat and on top of that, he was docked two places on the starting grid as a penalty for having used an unmarked set of tyres in second free practice on Saturday morning. Now, the 28-year old will try to make his way up into the race from eighth place on the grid. “That isn’t a drama, but eighth place is worse than first. Fortunately, I have 98 laps to improve”, said Spengler.

The two times’ DTM champion of 2008 and 2009, Timo Scheider (Audi) and Scot David Coulthard (Mercedes-Benz) were also disappointed as they got out of their cars after qualifying. Scheider will be starting from twelfth place, ’DC’ ended up 16th.

Five DTM drivers are having a home race at the circuit near London. With Susie Stoddart, Jamie Green, Gary Paffett and David Coulthard (all Mercedes-Benz) and Oliver Jarvis (Audi), British drivers make up almost one third of the DTM field.

The seventh DTM round of the season will cover 98 laps and a total distance of 189.042 kilometres. Because of the broadcasting of the Athletics World Championship, the race starts at 15.00 h German time. ARD will be broadcasting live from 14.40 h.