Marco Wittmann takes sixth career pole at the Red Bull Ring

Marco Wittmann took his first pole position of the year at this afternoon’s qualifying session at the Red Bull Ring, host of the second round of the 2016 Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters season. The session was a success for BMW Motorsport, with Tom Blomqvist completing the first row.

The 2014 champion set a best lap of 1:22.795, in what it now officially is a new track record for the series. Fellow BMW driver Tom Blomqvist was just 0.019 seconds slower at the wheel of his M4 DTM.

Second row of the grid was for Audi Sport, with Team Rosberg’s Adrian Tambay and Team Abt Sportsline’s Edoardo Mortara coming next. The winner of the season opener was only 0.137 seconds off the pace.

BMW was the strongest manufacturer in the session, taking the next three positions with Timo Glock, Maxime Martin and António Félix Da Costa, with only marginal differences between them.

Points’ leader Paul Di Resta was, in eighth position, the best placed driver for Mercedes AMG and the only one in the top ten for the Stuttgart manufacturer.

BMW’s Martin Tomczyk and Audi’s Mattias Ekström completed the top ten, with the Swede only 0.210 seconds behind pole position.

Gary Paffett managed to resolve the electrical issues that hampered his second free practice session to take part in the qualifying, but the Briton only managed to be 23^rd fastest, 0.664 seconds off the pace. Fellow Mercedes AMG driver Christian Vietoris was the only man behind Paffett, betting on a one-run strategy that didn’t pay off for the German driver from Team Mücke.

The session was largely trouble free, with only a couple of brief yellow flags due to drivers going wide.

After the session, Mercedes AMG’s Robert Wickens was reported to the stewards for allegedly blocking BMW’s Martin Tomczyk. The Canadian qualified in 13^th place.

Race 1 is scheduled for 17:45 CEST.