Photo: DTM Media

Robert Wickens takes last gasp pole at Spielberg

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Robert Wickens took a rather unexpected pole position for Mercedes at the end of a very tight session at the Spielberg circuit in Austria. The Canadian emerged just six-thousandths of a second quicker than BMW’s Timo Glock, as the Bavarian manufacturer locked out the second row with Marco Wittmann and Augusto Farfus next in the order.

A strong performance from Pascal Wehrlein saw him qualify fifth, the next best placed Mercedes driver, ahead of highest-placed Audi of Jamie Green, with Mercedes’ Christian Vietoris in seventh ahead of Maxime Martin’s BMW.

Drama started as early as Q1, during which Mercedes’ Gary Paffett didn’t make it out of the drop zone, despite setting the same time as Audi’s Timo Scheider. Scheider had completed his lap before the Brit, relegating the Mercedes in 19th. Audi’s Adrien Tambay was also knocked out of the first stage of qualifying, as was stablemate and title challenger Edoardo Mortara. Two C-Coupé cars were left at the back of the grid, with Vitaly Petrov ahead of Paul Di Resta, who was still suffering from the technical consequences of his accident earlier today.

Q2 saw defending champion Mike Rockenfeller end up in 14th, which means he will start from 17th after taking the penalty caused by his clash with Audi stablemate Adrien Tambay in Moscow. Rockenfeller is also under invesigation for an unsafe release in Q3. Title challenger Ekström was also out and will start from 15th, just behind fellow Audi driver Timo Scheider. Joey Hand and Bruno Spengler will fill the fifth row, with Martin Tomczyk lining up next to Dani Juncadella.

Antonio Félix da Costa will enjoy Scheider’s company on row 7, whereas Ekström will share the eighth row with the Audi of Miguel Molina.

The last part of qualifying was thrilling, with Robert Wickens putting in a perfect lap, just a blink of an eye quicker than Timo Glock. The Canadian took pole for Mercedes against a strong BMW squad led by Glock. Pascal Wehrlein and Jamie Green managed to keep Christian Vietoris and Maxime Martin at bay to claim row 3.

During the session, pole sitter Wickens had a major spin just before the last corner, but was able to keep his Mercedes in one piece and recomposing himself for his last minute pole position lap.

The race will start tomorrow at 13.33 CET.