BMW vows to fight after difficult qualifying at Lausitz

BMW haven’t hidden their disappointment after only being able to manage Marco Wittmann’s seventh position as their best grid result for tomorrow’s race at the Lausitzring. The young driver from Team RMG has dominated the season, with four victories, and being just fourth tomorrow would give him the title, in his only second season in the DTM.

The Bavarian manufacturer lost one man only two minutes into the qualifying session, after Joey Hand spun off the track and got stuck in the gravel trap, causing Q1 to be red-flagged. Still, the American was positive about his possibilities for tomorrow: “I just had understeer and came off the track. I then slipped on the wet grass and ended up stuck in the gravel. That was that. It was my mistake – I just pushed too hard on the first lap. It definitely had nothing to do with the short free practice. I have driven an entire 24-hour race after just one practice lap in the past.”

Jens Marquard, BMW Motorsport Director, was pragmatic in his evaluation: “The weather conditions made that a very difficult qualifying. After a short free practice, we were immediately confronted with qualifying. Unfortunately only one of our cars made it through to Q3. That does not reflect what we are really capable of. The weather could be the great unknown again on Sunday, which means a lot can happen in the race. Timing was key today, and it goes without saying that additional weight was noticeable. Congratulations to Pascal Wehrlein and Mercedes on pole position. A huge compliment goes to the fans: they stuck it out, although we were only able to offer then a 15-minute practice before qualifying. If tomorrow we show the pace we did in free practice today, then a lot is still possible in the race.”

Marco Wittmann is the centre of attention this weekend, but refuses to be thrown out of focus and insists on taking one step at the time: “Today was a lottery to see who had the best set-up from the word go. Nobody had time to fine-tune their set-up in the short practice, which is why everyone pretty much started from scratch in qualifying. We were not particularly well positioned. They were difficult conditions. I made it through to Q3, and that was important. Tomorrow I will look to get a good start and drive a good race. Then we will see where we end up at the finish.”

Timo Glock just missed out the opportunity to go onto the Q3. The Team MTEK driver set a best lap that could have put him in seventh position, should he had gone into the final part of the session, but he was ninth in the end. “We would easily have made the 46 thousandths of a second we missed out by. Unfortunately I was on a quick lap when Vitaly Petrov spun. At that point I was far faster than I had been, but had to abort the lap. We went for an aggressive tyre pressure in order to get the time on the first lap. That would have worked too, but unfortunately I had to stop my flying lap. That was just unlucky today”, said the German.

Bruno Spengler had an even worst time, the Canadian baffled at the impossibility of improving the setup in his BMW M4 DTM with the reduced practice time. The Team Schnitzer driver predicted a difficult race: “Unfortunately we did not go into qualifying with a good basis. The weather conditions meant we did not have the usual two hours of practice to prepare for the sessions. The 15 minutes were too few to adapt to the difficult conditions on the track. In my case, the balance of the car was not good. I had to battle just to get any half-decent lap time. I am obviously disappointed. It will be difficult to finish in the points from 17th on the grid. I am hoping for crazy conditions.”

Marco Wittmann’s title may be almost in the bag, but with Audi trailing by only 16 points in the Manufacturers’ standings, BMW is far from being able to relax in the remaining races.