Photo: DTM Media

António Félix Da Costa flies to pole as Edoardo Mortara suffers drama

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BMW Motorsport driver António Félix Da Costa achieved his second pole position of the weekend at Hockenheim, qualifying ahead of Mercedes’ Gary Paffett, while title protagonists Marco Wittmann and Edoardo Mortara will start from row three.

BMW’s Timo Glock was the first to set a benchmark with a time of 1:33.290, which was quickly beaten by Mercedes’ Gary Paffett and Audi’s Jamie Green.

Marco Wittmann managed to climb up to fifth position after his first attempt, further improving to second on his next lap.

Edoardo Mortara however had a problematic session, experiencing steering problems with his RS 5 DTM, stopping his first run in the session. The Italian returned to the pits, with the Audi mechanics frantically working to fix the car. The Team Abt mechanics sent him back on track with just eight minutes to go on used tyres to check the repairs, with Mortara returning to the pits to take on a fresh set without setting a time.

With just five minutes to go, all drivers went back on track for one final run.

António Félix Da Costa went to the top of the classification with a time of 1:32.632, with fellow BMW Schnitzer driver Martin Tomczyk going fifth. HWA Mercedes driver Robert Wickens initially moved up to third, while Da Costa further improved his time to 1:32.525.

Edoardo Mortara completed his first flying lap to put himself in third position, crossing the line with just enough time to do one more lap.

In the last minutes of the session Tom Blomqvist, Maxime Martin and Marco Wittmann improved to take third to fifth positions, with Edoardo Mortara not managing to improve his time, finishing in sixth, the best-placed of the Audis, and just 0.028 seconds slower than his title rival

Mercedes’ Robert Wickens was seventh, followed by BMW’s Timo Glock, Christian Vietoris and Audi’s Jamie Green completing the top ten.

With 17 points separating Wittmann and Mortara, the Italian needs to finish in the top two in this afternoon’s race and hope for trouble to befall his BMW rival to stand any chance of winning his first DTM title, but the outlook isn’t promising with five BMWs starting in the top ten.

The start of Race 2 is scheduled for 15:18 CET.