Sabine Schmitz looking forward to challenging from the back

Münnich Motorsport’s Sabine Schmitz is looking forward today’s races, where the 46-year-old Nordschleife expert will start from the back half of the field for both races in the Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1.

Schmitz qualified 15th, but will start 11th for race one courtesy of a number of engine change penalties, and says she has been struggling to adapt to the front-wheel driven WTCC car from her usual rear-wheel driven Porsche sportscar.

“When you come out of a GT car, it’s such a big different as front-wheel drive is really soft and you can’t really push too hard in the corners, unlike with the Porsche with the big rear tyres you can just go flat out and carry the speed,” she said.

Looking ahead to today’s races, she was pragmatic about her qualifying position and her expectations from the potentially high-contact sprint races.

“There are two good positions, one is the front and obviously I’m not there, so the second best position to start from the rear and then you have the whole disaster in front of you and then you can avoid the accidents. I’ve seen a couple of races and they really crash a lot, so I think that’s my chance.”