Photo: Audi Communications Motorsport

Audi Sport pleased with strong start of the DTM season

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Audi Sport has started the 2015 Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters season in the best way imaginable, after a very successful day in Hockenheim, with Jamie Green achieving a very authoritarian pole position and leaving no option to his rivals in the race.

The Briton from Team Rosberg won the race in the old “Jim Clark” style, from the start to the finish to win his first race with Audi. Starting on fresh tyres, he was able to pull away from his rivals and, despite two Safety Car neutralisations, which annulled his advantage, at no point was he challenged for the win.

Jamie Green was beaming after the race, becoming the provisional championship leader: “I was fast even last year but was simply unfortunate in the races. Today, everything went perfectly. I’m driving in the same team, have the same engineer and feel comfortable in my Audi RS 5 DTM. All I can say is I’m happy.”

The Ingolstadt’s manufacturer success’ was completed by having another three cars in the points, with Edo Mortara in fourth position, followed by Mike Rockenfeller and Nico Müller.

Not everything was perfect for Audi. Mattias Ekström made the only pit stop of the race as he suffered a puncture after being hit by another car. Timo Scheider and Miguel Molina were forced out after being on the receiving end of collisions.

Dieter Gass, Head of DTM, was pleased that all the effort made by the team is producing good fruits: “I’m very happy about the successful season opener. We delivered a very thrilling DTM race to the crowd which proves that the new race format is a step in the right direction. From our perspective it’s even more important that we’ve been able to make an initial assessment of where everyone stands and have seen that we did good work last winter. The Audi RS 5 DTM was the strongest car today and Jamie Green did the most impressive job of putting this on track. In the second half of the 2014 season he was already very fast. His first victory for Audi was practically in the air and simply overdue.”

Celebrations will be delayed as the hard work for Audi continues, with a new day of qualifying and a longer race taking place tomorrow.