Martin and Wittmann in the points at the Lausitzring in Sunday’s race – Blomqvist starts from front row for BMW.

Lausitzring.
At the Lausitzring (GER), Maxime Martin (BEL) completed his
50th DTM race – and the 70th race for BMW
Motorsport since the 2012 comeback – in eighth place. One day after
his fourth-place finish in the third race of the season, he claimed
four more points for the Drivers’ Championship on Sunday in his
SAMSUNG BMW M4 DTM. DTM champion Marco Wittmann (GER) marked his
60th DTM start by finishing ninth in the Red Bull BMW M4
DTM. Tom Blomqvist (GBR) had performed well in qualifying to start
from second place in the BMW Driving Experience M4 DTM but received
a five-second pit-stop penalty after a jump start and dropped out of
the points. A total of 67,500 spectators attended the Motorsport
Festival in the Lausitz region

.

 

Qualifying:
Tom Blomqvist just missed out on the
second pole position of his DTM career. He recorded a time of 1:16.323
minutes in his BMW Driving Experience M4 DTM to lead the standings
until just before the end of the session, when Robert Wickens (CAN,
Mercedes) bettered his performance. However, second place on the grid
is the best result of the season for Blomqvist and he was rewarded
with two points in the Drivers’ Championship. After finishing fourth
in Saturday’s race, Maxime Martin also performed well on Sunday,
qualifying in fifth position in his SAMSUNG BMW M4 DTM. Augusto Farfus
(BRA, Shell BMW M4 DTM) and Marco Wittmann also made it into the top
10, claiming ninth and tenth places respectively. Bruno Spengler (CAN,
BMW Bank M4 DTM) and Timo Glock (GER, DEUTSCHE POST BMW M4 DTM) were
close behind in twelfth and 13th positions.

 

The race:

Tom Blomqvist started from the front row and was able to defend his
second place in the early stages. However, he was punished for a jump
start with a five-second pit-stop penalty that dropped him out of the
points and couldn’t progress further than 17th place. The
race went better for Maxime Martin, who scored more points in the
Drivers’ Championship by finishing eighth. Marco Wittmann also made it
into the top ten, finishing ninth after a late pit stop. Augusto
Farfus, Timo Glock and Bruno Spengler crossed the line in
14th, 15th and 16th positions.

 

The reactions:

 

BMW Motorsport Director Jens Marquardt: “Sunday’s
race was also a tough one for us here at the Lausitzring. Of course,
finishing with our best-placed cars in eighth and ninth positions is
not the result we were hoping for. It was unfortunate that Tom made
the jump start, even if it was very tight and that influenced the
outcome of the race but we have to take a close look at the race as a
whole and examine our strategy. It went well for Marco and he was able
to maintain the pace. It could be that we called him in too early,
otherwise he may have been able to improve by a few places. Overall,
we didn’t choose particularly aggressive tactics, unlike Audi for
example. You could see that their tactics paid off twice. It really
wasn’t a great weekend for us. Congratulations to Audi on their win.”

 

Stefan Reinhold (team principal, BMW Team RMG): “We
had a difficult start to the weekend on Saturday. We worked really
hard again for the second race and we did manage to improve. But it
was an unequal struggle for us in the race really. We are happy to
have scored a few points at least. Marco drove a great race and the
strategy was right. I would like to compliment all the mechanics on
their hard work – weekends where we don’t win many points are just as demanding.”

 

Marco Wittmann (#11, Red Bull BMW M4 DTM – Grid position:
10th, race result: 9th – 60 races, 8 wins, 16
podiums, 8 pole positions, 541 points, 2 Drivers’ titles):
“I am fairly pleased with the result. We did the best we
could today. I had decent pace and I was able to drive a long time
before the first stop. I battled my way up to ninth, had a great
contest with Lucas Auer and closed the gap to the cars ahead. However,
the Audis were pretty much unassailable today. We still have plenty of
work to do.”

 

Augusto Farfus (#15, Shell BMW M4 DTM – Grid position:
9th, race result: 14th – 70 races, 4 wins, 12
podiums, 5 pole positions, 345 points):
“We were better in
qualifying today but we simply didn’t have the required racing pace
and that means that you can’t do much in the race. Everyone could see
that all the BMWs were struggling with that in the race.”

 

Timo Glock (#16, DEUTSCHE POST BMW M4 DTM – Grid position:
13th, race result: 15th – 60 races, 3 wins, 6
podiums, 2 pole positions, 238 points):
“We had a tough
weekend here – and unfortunately we didn’t score any points. The fact
remains: the Lausitzring isn’t our favourite circuit. The other teams
were too strong here. Now we have to make sure that we are better set
up for the other tracks. Nonetheless, I’d like to thank my team as the
lads did a great job with no mistakes.”

 

Bart Mampaey (team principal, BMW Team RBM): “It was
a difficult race, starting with Tom’s jump start. We will have to
analyse that. The penalty meant that he had no chance in the race. We
tried out a different strategy with Bruno and that worked quite well.
We tried our best but it just didn’t quite work out. Maxime gave his
all once again and eighth place was the best we were able to achieve.
Now we have to work hard to ensure that we perform better in the next
races at the Hungaroring.”

 

Bruno Spengler (#7, BMW Bank BMW M4 DTM – Grid position:
12th, race result: 16th – 143 races, 14 wins,
45 podiums, 17 pole positions, 760 points, 1 Drivers’ title):
“We tried out a strategy with an early pit stop. With a bit
of luck, you can go quite a long way with that kind of strategy. But
it means that you drive for practically the whole race on one set of
tyres, which was pretty difficult for us here. We have plenty of work
to do and will try to improve our performance over the distance in
particular. That is our challenge for the upcoming races.”

 

Tom Blomqvist (#31, BMW Driving Experience M4 DTM – Grid
position: 2nd, race result: 17th – 40 races, 1
win, 5 podiums, 1 pole position, 174 points):
“I was having
problems with the clutch, which lead to a jump start as I moved. I was
really disappointed when I heard that I was being penalised. I didn’t
really attack after that, but I wouldn’t have had the pace for it. We
need to find out why we are having problems with the race pace.”

 

Maxime Martin (#36, SAMSUNG BMW M4 DTM – Grid position:
5th, race result: 8th – 50 races, 2 wins, 6
podiums, 2 pole positions, 248 points):
“It was a difficult
race. We have to work on our race pace and realise that qualifying
alone is not the key to success. We now have to push on and prepare
for the next race.”

 

The standings:

 

Drivers: 1. Lucas Auer (69 points), 2. Jamie Green
(53), 3. Gary Paffett (46), 4. Mike Rockenfeller (41), 5. Robert
Wickens (38), 6. Mattias Ekström (32), 7. René Rast (31), 8.
Timo Glock (25),
9. Nico Müller (20), 10. Edoardo Mortara
(19), 11. Marco Wittmann (18),
12. Maxime Martin (17), 13. Paul di Resta (12), 14.
Maro Engel (3), 15. Bruno Spengler (2), 16. Tom Blomqvist (2),
17. Augusto Farfus (0),
18. Loic Duval (0).

 

Teams: 1. Mercedes-AMG Motorsport BWT (88 points), 2.
Audi Sport Team Rosberg (84), 3. Mercedes-AMG Motorsport Mercedes me
(84), 4. Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline (52), 5. Audi Sport Team
Phoenix (41), 6. BMW Team RMR (27), 7. BMW Team RBM (19), 8.
BMW Team RMG (18),
9. Mercedes-AMG Motorsport SILBERPFEIL
Energy (15).

 

Manufacturers: 1. Mercedes (187 points), 2. Audi
(177), 3. BMW (64)
.

 

The service:

BMW Motorsport will offer an innovative Chatbot service for
journalists for the first time in the 2017 DTM season. This allows
users to receive the latest information directly to their smartphone
via WhatsApp Messenger. The information available includes driver
statistics, statements and photos. You can register for the BMW
Motorsport Chatbot at the following link: http://bit.ly/BMW_Motorsport_Media_Broadcast_EN