2015 DTM : Molina celebrates first DTM victory

2015 DTM Nürburgring Race 2 winner :

Miguel Molina (ESP) #17 - Teufel Audi RS 5 DTM - Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline

Fans at the Nürburgring, where 69,000 spectators attended the event over the weekend, were treated to exceptionally good touring car racing: with entertaining position fights and closely-fought door-to-door duels, there were entertaining battles for the best positions and valuable points for the drivers’ standings in the 16th DTM race of the season. Miguel Molina only had little to do with all that: with a faultless drive, the Audi driver had his name written on the winners’ list at the Nürburgring and also scored his first major achievement in his 67th DTM race. Having started from pole position, the Spaniard scored a dominant and undisputed win in the 43 laps long DTM race on Sunday. “I have been waiting for a long time for my maiden win and now, we finally made it. Today is my day,” the jubilant winner said after the finish. Mercedes-Benz driver Paul Di Resta finished second in the Eifel, 7.5 seconds down. For the 2010 DTM champion, this was his best result of the season so far. BMW’s Bruno Spengler rounded out the Nürburgring podium by finishing third.

Miguel Molina (ESP) #17 - Teufel Audi RS 5 DTM - Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline

Behind fourth-placed Tom Blomqvist, Pascal Wehrlein finished fifth to extend his lead in the DTM drivers’ standings. His direct rivals in the battle for the championship crown, Edoardo Mortara and Mattias Ekström, didn’t score any points on Sunday. Ekström finished eleventh, Mortara retired after a collision with Timo Glock on lap 28.

Behind fourth-placed Tom Blomqvist, Pascal Wehrlein finished fifth to extend his lead in the DTM drivers’ standings. His direct rivals in the battle for the championship crown, Edoardo Mortara and Mattias Ekström, didn’t score any points on Sunday. Ekström finished eleventh, Mortara retired after a collision with Timo Glock on lap 28.

Race 2 - Report

Start	Green stalls. Molina in front. Scheider and Wickens collide in the first corner.
Lap 1	Wittmann taps Paffett into a spin. Safety car deployed because Scheider's car is stuck in the gravel in turn 1. Wittmann, Wickens into the pits.
Lap 2	Molina is leading from Blomqvist, Di Resta, Spengler, Farfus, Wehrlein, Götz, Glock, Juncadella, Rockenfeller.
Lap 3	Safety car in at the end of this lap. Wittmann under investigation for pushing another car.
Lap 4	Restart. For the moment, no position changes. Wittmann will be reported to the stewards of the meeting.
Lap 5	Wehrlein is sixth, Ekström is already up in tenth place. The reason for Wickens's retirement is broken suspension.
Lap 7	The use of DRS is now permitted.
Lap 8	Paffett into the pits - he retires.
Lap 9	Di Resta overtakes Blomqvist in the first corner and moves up into second. Glock and Juncadella collide, Ekström gets past.
Lap 10	Wehrlein overtakes Farfus and Götz and is now fifth. Götz gets past Farfus as well.
Lap 11	Juncadella also finds his way past Farfus.
Lap 12	Glock under investigation for a collision with Juncadella. Di Resta, Spengler, Blomqvist, Juncadella, Ekström, Glock, Martin, Félix da Costa into the pits.
Lap 13	No further action against Glock. Wehrlein, Götz, Farfus, Tomczyk, Mortara, Auer, Wittmann into the pits.
Lap 14	Molina into the pits.
Lap 15	Vietoris into the pits.
Lap 16	Tambay, Green into the pits.
Lap 17	Müller into the pits.
Lap 19	Wehrlein attacks Farfus for eighth, but initially to no avail, just like Ekström can't find a way past Glock for tenth. Wehrlein overtakes Farfus on the outside under braking for the Veedol chicane.
Lap 20	Ekström will be reported to the stewards of the meeting - pit stop light on his car not working.
Lap 21	Rockenfeller into the pits.
Lap 23	All drivers having made their stops, Molina is leading from Di Resta, Spengler, Blomqvist, Götz, Juncadella, Wehrlein, Rockenfeller, Farfus and Glock.
Lap 22	Auer into the pits for a second time.
Lap 24	Mortara attacks Tomczyk for twelfth, but Tomczyk stays in front.
Lap 25	Rockenfeller attacks Wehrlein in the battle for seventh, but to no avail.
Lap 26	Wehrlein finds a way past Juncadella for sixth, Juncadella keeps Rockenfeller at bay.
Lap 27	Ekström overtakes Glock for tenth place under braking for the first corner.
Lap 28	Mortara overtakes Glock, but ten the two collide and Mortara spins out. The situation is under investigation by the stewards. Mortara gets a warning for pushing another car, Glock gets a drive-through. Mortatra into the pits - he retires.
Lap 29	Glock into the pits for his penalty.
Lap 33	Götz allows Wehrlein through for fifth.
Lap 34	Ekström tries to get past Juncadella, but fails. In turn, Tomczyk passes both of them and is now ninth. Ekström drops back to eleventh.
Lap 43	Final lap.
Finish	Molina wins from Di Resta, Spengler, Blomqvist, Wehrlein, Götz, Rockenfeller, Farfus, Tomczyk, Juncadella.

RACE 1 - REPORT

In their home race at the Nürburgring, Maxime Martin and his BMW team RMG celebrated victory in their home round at the Nürburgring. Second place in the action-packed race on Saturday went to Audi driver Edoardo Mortara while points’ leader Pascal Wehrlein extended his lead by finishing third. Behind Wehrlein, three further Mercedes-Benz drivers finished in the top six.

Standing on the roof of his BMW M4 DTM after a spectacular race, Martin cheered in the pit lane about the second DTM win of his career: “I am incredibly proud. Winning here at this track is simply just fantastic.” Audi driver Mortara made a comeback in the battle for the title by finishing second: “A great race in which I was rewarded with second place. That is great, but we want more.” Thrilling on-track duels marked the race on Saturday, in which the drivers didn’t give anything away between them. One of the drivers to experience this was Pascal Wehrlein in the first corner of the race, when he tangled with the eventual winner. Nevertheless, Wehrlein secured himself third place, extended his lead in the drivers’ standings, but still wasn’t entirely happy. “When you head into the first corner as the leader and then are being dealt such a blow, you just can’t be happy. But I have watched the footage of the situation once again. Maxime played it absolutely fair. There was a gap and he used it.” Especially the duels and the overtaking manoeuvres at the end of the main straight added plenty of top-class action to the race.

As so often this season, there was plenty of turmoil right after the start. Pole sitter Lucas Auer had to let Martin and Wehrlein, who started behind him, get past. The two tangled before the first corner while an unfazed Martin used a gap on the inside. While the BMW driver took the lead in the race, both Bruno Spengler, who had started from fourth, and Mortara, who was fifth on the grid, went past Wehrlein. For pole-sitter Auer, the action initially ended in seventh place.

Only soon after that, there was a collision between Jamie Green and Miguel Molina in the midfield that led to the interruption of the race (red flag). Rookie driver Tom Blomqvist had tangled with Green’s Audi in the Mercedes Arena, after which Green spun and Molina wasn’t able to avoid the collision. Oil and carbon parts on the track had to be removed, which was the reason that the race was interrupted for almost 15 minutes.

Directly after the restart, Martin pulled clear from the rest of the field and gradually extended his lead. “Still, it was a tough job, because my tyres significantly degraded towards the end of the race.” Behind the eventual winner, there was an entertaining three-way fight between title candidates Spengler, Mortara and Wehrlein. The Canadian with the black BMW defended his position for a long time, but Mortara made his decisive move for second place on lap 15: the Italian went past on the inside. A thrilling manoeuvre that couldn’t be completed without contact. “Initially, I was slightly worried that something could be damaged,” Mortara said, whose worries weren’t confirmed. For Spengler, however, the race was over after a few more laps. Initially, he tried to keep on, but had to stop in the pits on lap 18 with a puncture and a damaged front section of his car, and thus probably also saw his final hopes of winning the title fade away.

Gary Paffett demonstrated his competitive skills once again and made it up from 14th on the grid to finish fourth. The two DTM rookies Maximilian Götz and Lucas Auer finished in fifth and sixth place. Seventh position went to last year’s champion Marco Wittmann, who successfully defended his position from eighth-placed Robert Wickens. With a surprising overtaking move in the chicane, António Félix da Costa secured ninth place and demoted Mattias Ekström to tenth.

Ekström, Wehrlein’s fiercest rival in the battle for the title prior to the race at Nürburgring, at least managed to make up seven places in the race, but probably still wasn’t quite happy. After all, Ekström’s gap to the 20-year old increased and he lost his second place in the drivers’ standings to fellow Audi driver Mortara. With three remaining races, Wehrlein has a total score of 155 points after 15 races, Mortara 128 and Ekström 127. Should Wehrlein take victory in the race on Sunday at 13.35 hrs and his rivals Mortara and Ekström don’t score, he can already be crowned as the 2015 champion.

2015 DTM - Nürburgring Race Result