Paul di Resta leaves it late to top final Norisring practice
Mercedes Team HWA’s Paul di Resta topped the final free practice session at Norisring, heading a flurry of late improvers to set his best lap as the chequered flag fell.
The Scotsman’s best lap of 48.182 meant he finished 0.034 ahead of Audi Team Phoenix driver Timo Scheider, who himself had set the best lap of the session as the clock hit zero.
Audi Team Abt Sportsline’s Mattias Ekström was third ahead of Lucas Auer in the Team Mücke Mercedes, with BMW Team RMG’s Marco Wittmann rounding out the top five.
Gary Paffett, Saturday race winner Edoardo Mortara, Mike Rockenfeller, Antonio Felix Da Costa and Adrien Tambay rounded out the top 10 in what was once again a tightly packed field, with the top eight within 0.2s of each other and the whole field covered by little over 0.6s.
Mercedes Team ART’s Paffett started the final spree of improvements by heading the times with six minutes to go, swapping P1 with di Resta before Ekström hit the summit.
Scheider then set his best lap at the very end, before di Resta improved once more to finish fastest, 0.038 slower than Christian Vietoris’s pole time from Saturday.
Next up for the DTM is qualifying for the longer second race, which gets underway at 10:50 CET.
