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Augusto Farfus tops disrupted FP2 in Austria

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BMW Team RBM driver Augusto Farfus topped the second practice session of the day at the Red Bull Ring. The Brazilian put an impressive two-tenths of a second gap between himself and the second-placed Mercedes of Christian Vietoris, with Miguel Molina third, making it a BMW-Mercedes-Audi top three.

The session was entertaining as the drivers spent the last ten minutes improving their lap times, resulting in a before-struggling Farfus topping the sheets at the chequered flag.

Jamie Green came fourth for Audi ahead of Robert Wickens’ Mercedes and the BMW duo of Martin Tomczyk and António Félix Da Costa. Pascal Wehrlein put his Mercedes in eighth ahead of Timo Glock and Bruno Spengler, who rounded out the top ten.

The championship front-runners all struggled, with BMW Team Schnitzer’s Bruno Spengler was the first of them in tenth. Championship leader Marco Wittmann was 13th just ahead of title rival Mattias Ekström’s Audi, with reigning champion Mike Rockenfeller down in 15th and Edoardo Mortara in 19th.

The session was red flagged as former Sahara Force India F1 driver Paul Di Resta had a big off at the second-to-last corner, hitting the wall hard with the right rear of his Mercedes C-Coupé. Among several other minor offs, Mercedes’ Robert Wickens had a spectacular 360° spin at high speed at the same spot where stablemate Di Resta crashed a little later.

Qualifying for the DTM starts at 18.10 CET.