Round 8 of the DTM is about to start at Oschersleben. Jamie Green will be starting from pole position today, followed by championship leader, Mike Rockenfeller, in third. Live timing is available HERE. Twitter updates from the official Audi Sport twitter account are available HERE. You can watch the race right here, embedded from the live YouTube stream:
After a very strong qualifying session yesterday, Rob Austin again performed very well in today's Race 1. The Audi driver had a fine third place in a very chaotic race.
Rob Austin with his #13 Audi A4 NGTC started from third place but lost several positions at the start. Behind bad luck hit his team mate Will Bratt. The driver of the #14 Audi A4 NGTC spun and was collected by a Ford Focus. Will Bratt was forced to retire. The Safety Car was deployed and Rob Austin was running ninth after his bad start. When the race resumed Rob Austin started a great recovery passing the drivers in front of him one by one. "Sherman" was flying on track setting the fastest lap times of the race. With some laps left Rob Austin was able to overtake the works MG of Jason Plato after a titanic battle for fourth place. Two lap later Rob Austin passed the factory Honda of Gordon Shedden in the last corner of the last lap. Rob Austin takes a fine podium confirming the strong pace of his WIX Racing Audi A4 NGTC.
Race 2 is coming next. Rob Austin will start from third place again, whilst Will Bratt will start from the back.
Audi driver Jamie Green will be tackling the eighth race of the DTM season at Oschersleben in the Red Bull Audi RS 5 DTM of Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline from the pole position after the fastest driver in qualifying, Bruno Spengler (BMW), received a five-place grid penalty due to a violation of the regulations in qualifying. For the 31-year-old, this marks the seventh pole position in the DTM in total and the first one as an Audi driver. Just like Miguel Molina and Adrien Tambay the Briton will start the race on option tires. All other Audi drivers will start on standard tires. “I’m doing increasingly well in handling the Audi RS 5 DTM and my engineer Alex (Stehlig) did a good job in qualifying yesterday because we were out on track at the right time. The pole position is a nice reward for this.”
The Italian GT Championship is at Vallelguna this weekend, for sixth round of the season. Audi Sport Italia is taking part in the event with their two regular Audi R8 LMS ultra cars.
Race 1 held this morning gave the official Audi Italia dealer team a fine result. Strong second for the #5 Audi R8 LMS ultra with drivers Alex Frassineti and Johan Kritoffersson. After a very frought race the two drivers were really close to the winning BMW Z4 GT3 from ROAL Motorsport. The Audi was very fast catching the BMW car for the race lead but time was running out. In the end Alex Frassineti and Johan Kritoffersson were only 0.644 behind the Team BMW Italia car and setting the fastest lap of the race. A great performance after the hard qualifying sessions yesterday.
Harder race for the the sister #4 Audi R8 LMS ultra which was further behind. The car shared by Dindo Capello and Andrea Sonvico finished fifth overall.
GT Asia resumed in Malaysia this weekend, where the fourth meeting of the season was hosted at Sepang. Absolute Racing was out in full force and they achieved great results during the second race.
Absolute Racing fielded a total of five Audi cars this weekend, three Audi R8 LMS ultra cars in the GT3 class, and two older Audi R8 LMS variants in the GTM class.
Their team was split into two main parts. The R8 LMS ultra cars were entered under the team/entrant name of “Team R8 LMS ultra”, which represents three customers: J-Fly Racing, Tunewear Racing and Team Hong Kong Racing. The #7 J-Fly Racing car was racing in its new red/black/white livery for the first time in GT Asia, a livery which they debuted on the car at the Sepang 12 Hours two weeks ago. The #7 was driven by Jeffrey Lee and Marchy Lee. The #888 Tunewear R8 LMS ultra was driven by Francis Hideki Onda and Alex Yoong. The #98 Team Hong Kong Racing R8 LMS ultra was driven by Philip Ma and Cong Fu Cheng.
Two Audi R8 LMS Cup entries had also been added to the Absolute Racing GT Asia squad this weekend, both entered in the GTM class. The first was a second J-Fly Racing entry, the blue #78 Audi R8 LMS of Benjamin Lee and Craig Liu. The final Audi entry was that of the Tiger Racing Team, who also recently took part in the Sepang 12 hours. The #77 R8 LMS was driven by Jacky Yeung and Carlo van Dam.
Qualifying was highlighted by two front row starting positions: the #888 grabbed second on the grid for race one and the #7 did the same for race two. Pole in the GTM class went to the #77 for race one.
The first race was held on Saturday and saw the Audis battling near the front. By the end of the race the three GT3 Audis placed in positions six through eight, with the #7 of Marchy and Jeffrey Lee finishing sixth ahead of the #98 and the #888. The #77 Tiger Racing R8 LMS of Yeung and van Dam finished second in the GTM class. The first race was won by the #83 AF Course Ferrari 485 Italia.
Race two was held on Sunday and saw podium results for the Audi team. The #7 J-Fly Audi R8 LMS ultra of Marchy and Jeffrey Lee finished in second place. They were followed by the #888 Audi in sixth and the #98 in eighth. The #77 Tiger Racing R8 LMS of Yeung and van Dam went one better today, as they took victory in the GTM class, finishing tenth overall. The #78 finished fourth in GTM. The second race was again won by the #83 AF Course Ferrari 485 Italia.
The fifth GT Asia round will be taking place at Zhuhai in China during mid-October.
