Lucas Auer tops wet morning warm-up in Hockenheim
Art Grand Prix driver Lucas Auer was the fastest man in the 15-minute warm-up session held this morning at Hockenheim, host of the ninth round of the 2015 Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters season.
Rain had fallen over the area during the night and, although it had stopped, the session was held on a wet track, with rain tyres required for all drivers.
Audi Sport dominated the session, although the final laps on a drying track determined the final classification. Although the session was trouble free, newly crowned champion Pascal Wehrlein spun off the track half way through, causing a momentary yellow flag, but managed to recover without assistance.
Mercedes AMG drivers Paul di Resta, Maximilian Götz and Robert Wickens had lap times deleted due to having taken advantage by exceeding the track limits. The Canadian had set the fastest time of the session before the stewards’ intervention.
Lucas Auer set a best lap of 1:47.447, with Audi’s Jamie Green in second place, 0.127 seconds behind the Austrian. Mattias Ekström and Nico Müller followed in their RS 5 DTMs, with Mercedes’ Christian Vietoris and Pascal Wehrlein immediately after.
Audi’s contingent followed, with Mike Rockenfeller in seventh place, with Miguel Molina, Edoardo Mortara, Timo Scheider and Adrien Tambay following. The Frenchman was 11th, just 0.812 seconds off the pace.
Timo Glock was, in 13th place, the best man for BMW motorsport, 0.903 seconds behind Auer’s register.
It is expected that the mild fog over Hockenheim will lift and the weather will stay dry, albeit cold, so the teams are counting on a dry track for today’s qualifying session and race.
The qualifying session for Race 2 is scheduled for 11:40.
