DTM – ​Audi scores one-two victory at motorsport festival

“We experienced a tremendous motorsport festival at the Lausitzring. The crowd was impressive, especially on Sunday. Obviously, that was the outstanding day for us, too: a one-two victory and five Audi cars in the top seven positions – you could hardly wish for more. We’ve now won two of the first four races and had at least one driver on podium every time. This speaks for our squad and the new Audi RS 5 DTM that is extremely strong over the race distance. In qualifying, there’s still some room for improvement, although Jamie (Green) on Sunday was only lacking 0.027 seconds for pole position. Except for the Norisring, I can’t remember ever having seen such a close qualifying. The race, too, was highly entertaining again. We’re already looking forward to Budapest, as well as to the short breather, because the entire squad has been working extremely hard in recent weeks and months.” Jamie Green (Hoffmann Group Audi RS 5 DTM #53) position 10 / position 1 “It’s been a weekend with highs and lows. Saturday with an average qualifying and only position twelve on the grid was frustrating. Then there was the mistake in qualifying with one of René’s used tires on my car. As a result, I had to start from the last position on the grid. I managed to fight back to tenth place, which was a tough battle. On Sunday, things went better in terms of the setup, ‘many thanks’ from me to Audi Sport Team Rosberg for the hard work. I managed a good lap in qualifying and was in grid position three. I had to battle my way through the race and that worked out pretty well. Celebrating two victories on the first two race weekends is great.” Mike Rockenfeller (Schaeffler Audi RS 5 DTM #99) position 5 / position 5 “My hopes had been a little higher, but I think that on the whole we can be happy. We finished in the top five twice. Both of the qualifying sessions weren’t really ideal, but in the race we advanced nicely. I think we’re constantly learning with the new tires, the new format and the new car. I’m already looking forward to Budapest. That’s a track I think is really cool. I’m hoping for us to be able to make another step forward.” Mattias Ekström (Red Bull Audi RS 5 DTM #5) position 8 / position 2 “In terms of qualifying performance, the weekend was rather poor for me – that does bother me quite a bit. At least the two races were good. I had a few nice overtaking maneuvers, brought good points home and have hardly any scratches on the car. To sum it up: two great races following poor qualifying sessions.” René Rast (AUTO BILD MOTORSPORT Audi RS 5 DTM #33) position 3 / position 7 “On the whole, I’m obviously satisfied with the weekend. My first podium on Saturday was awesome and on Sunday, in position seven, I managed to score solid points again. That we’re consistently fast gives me a particularly positive feeling. Fourth and sixth in the qualifying session, plus the fastest race lap twice: we can definitely build on that for the coming races.” Nico Müller (Playboy Audi RS 5 DTM #51) position 18 / position 6 “We were consistently fast throughout the weekend at the Lausitzring: always good for the top eight in qualifying and the race pace was good, too. Unfortunately, a technical issue took us out of the race on Saturday when we were heading for a top-five result. On Sunday, I had a great race as well in which I overtook a lot of cars. But then there was a mistakable radio message from race control. I understood it to mean that I should give back a position after I’d just overtaken Maxime (Martin). In order to not risk a drive-through penalty I let him pass. Afterwards, I had to overtake him again and lost a lot of time in the process. That was frustrating, but the consistency we showed here gives me a positive feeling for the future.” Loïc Duval (Castrol EDGE Audi RS 5 DTM #77) position 15 / position 18 “For me, personally, it’s been another difficult weekend, but at least a successful one for Audi – that obviously makes me happy. I try to concentrate on the positive things. In the first race, I set good lap times at least in my second stint and on Sunday, things went better after the pit stop as well. I posted the fourth-fastest lap time. But in total, all the things don’t fit together yet. We’re going to continue to work on that. In any case, I continue to be fully motivated and would like to battle for the top positions with the squad. Hopefully we’ll be able to do that already at Budapest.”