2007 Season Review – Part Two

The Danish Touring Car Championship 2007 was a strong year for the series. A strong field of almost 30 cars took part in eight races which consisted of two qualifying heats and a main race. The championship came to stand between Michel Nykjær and a BMW-armada consisting of John Nielsen, Jan Magnussen and defending champion Casper Elgaard. TouringCarTimes has put together a season review. Here is part two of the DTC season review.

5th race
Hattrick from Nielsen – Impressiv debut from Nicki Thiim

John Nielsen was the man of the weekend with his three race wins. But there was also another driver with a great performance: Nicki Thiim. The son of former DTM driver Kurt Thiim showed a big show.

The 18 year-old got his DTC debut at Poulsen Motorsport, because his father was absent at the Le Mans Series in Belgium. In qualification heat 1 he managed to move from eighth to fifth place, while in the second qualification heat he made a minor mistake, before impressing everybody, when he was the only driver to shadow John Nielsen in the final. But with an impressive hattrick of wins in both the two qualification heats and the final BMW driver John Nielsen shot from fourth position overall to become the new championship leader with an eight point lead in front of Seat Leon driver Michel Nykjær.

In not a single of the three heats were his wins in serious doubt. From pole position in the first heat John Nielsen built up a good cushion, and even though his win in this heat gave him grid position eight for qualification heat two, he also managed to gain the lead here.

The opening laps of that heat saw many crashes which eliminated many better placed drivers, so the only position gaining move that John Nielsen made, was when he moved past the pole sitting Peugeot 407 of David Falch. Chevrolet Lacetti driver Pontus Mörth was eliminated in a multiple car crash with Casper Elgaard and Jan Magnussen, when the trio was heading for the chikane side by side, while another prominent name in the battle for the championship, Michael Outzen, had been sent off the circuit seconds earlier in another incident.

Summer break championship leader Michel Nykjær had a bad day as well, when he outbraked himself and went into the gravel trap.

Race 6
BMW wins again

Jan Magnussen became a very convincing winner of the major round of the Danish Touringcar Championship held at Jyllandsringen. The BMW 320si E90 driver won the first qualification heat from Seat Leon driver Michel Nykjær and reigning champion Casper Elgaard, then climbed from eighth position on the grid to fifth at the chequered flag in the second qualification heat, securing him pole position for the final.

In this race he just romped away into the distance, never being challenged, and with his win he reduced his deficit to the championship leader from 43 to 21 points. The second qualification heat see the top eight drivers from the first qualification heat start in reverse order, and thus Jason Watt got his first pole position for three years in the Danish Touringcar Championship. At the start the 2002 championship winner led from Henrik Lundgaard’s Chevrolet Lacetti and Nicki Thiim’s BMW 320si E90, but within a lap and a half, both had moved by him and started fighting for the lead.

Several times the son of Kurt Thiim made attempts of passing the leading car, and the pair even touched each other a couple of times, but he never managed to avoid Henrik Lundgaard giving Chevrolet its first race win in the series after entering this year. The final saw Michel Nykjær finish in the runner-up spot, and as John Nielsen’s BMW 320si E90 was fiercely ballasted following his Padborg Park successes three weeks earlier, he could not keep up with the pace of the Seat Leon driver, who duly retook the championship lead. “It was difficult with all the kilos in the car, and it all happened as I had predicted,” John Nielsen said. “I had hoped that I could inherit some positions or gain from others driver’s errors, but nothing went my way. On average I did get a top 5 position in the races, and that was okay.”

Race 7
Pontus Mörth claims first race win for Chevrolet in DTC

The two Chevrolet Lacetti drivers Pontus Mörth and Henrik Lundgaard dominate the seventh round of this years Danish touringcar series. The swede Mörth won the first and his teammate Lundgaard the second qualification race.

“I have been fighting for this for many years, and this year I have been doing well twice at this circuit, and it was just wonderful to finally win a DTC final. It was also nice to see that other cars than BMWs and Seats can win in the series,” the jubilant winner said.” In the first qualification heat Pontus Mörth took the lead from Seat Leon driver Michel Nykjær and top BMW privateer Michael Outzen, but neither seemed interested in pushing the Chevrolet driver, as they both were intent on scoring valuable points rather than battle for a possible win.

Especially championship leader Michel Nykjær wanted to play things safe, as title rivals Jan Magnussen was suffering from a car with lots of success ballast while John Nielsen’s Team Essex BMW 320si E90 was really off form. For the second qualification heat Robert Schlünssen started from pole position, but he soon got under pressure from Henrik Lundgaard, and midway through the heat the black and red Peugeot was passed by the blue Chevrolet, which went on to take a win.

Initially the Hartmann Honda twins of Jens Edman and Martin Jensen tried to put pressure on Robert Schlünssen, but he withstood it, while a bit further down the field Michel Nykjær elected to let Pontus Mörth take sixth place from him. Based on the results of the two qualification heats the front row of the final consisted of Pontus Mörth and Henrik Lundgaard, and the Chevrolet twin also led the field away in front of Michel Nykjær and Jan Magnussen.

Also a difficult race had BMW driver John Nielsen. In the final John Nielsen could only manage eighth place, which means that his second place in the championship standings was taken over by Jan Magnussen, and now the two BMW drivers are the only ones with a chance of fighting Michel Nykjær for the title in three week’s time at Jyllandsringen.

8th race
Michel Nykjær is the Danish champion

The 2007 Danish Touringcar Championship is Michel Nykjær. That was the conclusion after the second of three races on Sunday at FDM Jyllandsringen. At that time the Seat Leon had amassed so many points that neither Jan Magnussen nor John Nielsen could catch him at the top of the points table.

The first of the three heats had quite a calm start to it, as all drivers seemed to play a waiting game, with John Nielsen and Casper Elgaard holding onto a secore 1-2 Team Essex lead in front of the Chevrolet twins of Pontus Mörth and Henrik Lundgaard. Michel Nykjær was further down the field, while Jan Magnussen found it difficult making progress from a lowly 12th place grid position. But then midways through the race, things suddenly changed.

Jan Magnussen got stuck in a very intense battle with newly crowned privateer champion Michael Outzen, and often during the race the two drivers were not having all four wheels on the tarmac, the end result being a collision which sent Michael Outzen into a spin, making Jan Magnussen’s championship hopes no good either.

With the top eight positions reversed on the grid for race two, Kurt Thiim led this race in front of Michel Nykjær and Tom Pedersen, and the latter driver was quite obviously the fastest one, as he managed to get past Michel Nykjær. But race one winner John Nielsen did not really make progress from his starting position as number eight, as his alternator broke down and made the use of the car’s power-steering impossible.

With the name of the title holder settled for the final, there was still a battle for second and third place in the championship between Jan Magnussen and John Nielsen. The former moved up from eighth on the grid to finish fifth, while John Nielsen gained the lead from team mate and out-going champion Casper Elgaard with three laps to go, eventually clinching the runner-up-position in front of Jan Magnussen.

With the 1-2 finish in its last DTC appearance Team Essex clinched the team’s title.