The man from Linz, who was fifth the day before after the race control took back a penalty, prevailed on Sunday ahead of the German Mercedes duo Luca Stolz and Maro Engel. In the overall standings, Lucas Auer, who was sixth after a super finish, took second place. He is only eleven points behind Sheldon van der Linde.
Preining again delivered a strong performance – peppered with a few overtaking manoeuvres. On lap 16 he overtook Engel from pole position. After his pit stop, the 24-year-old, who won his first DTM race at the Norisring in July, didn’t give up. Preining is the first Austrian DTM winner ever in Spielberg. “I thought before the start that it would be a great race,” said the new fourth overall. A win in Austria “is all the better. We’ll celebrate well today.”
A conciliatory conclusion for Auer
Auer was happy about a conciliatory end to the day after being far from the front in qualifying and well over half of the race distance. For the Tyrolean, switching to dry tires turned out to be the right move. He then made his way into the top ten. “Credits to the team, they made the decision. I thought it wouldn’t work,” revealed the Mercedes-AMG driver. “In the last laps I finally managed to switch on the tires and finished sixth. I’m happy with that too.” The fastest lap also went to Auer.
In contrast to his compatriot, Philipp Eng (BMW) was on his way to the podium for a long time, but was caught in the end and finished fifth. A black weekend was completed for championship leader Van der Linde. The BMW driver finished 12th but retained the overall lead. The German Rene Rast (Audi) also finished eleventh empty-handed. The Tyrolean Clemens Schmid (Lamborghini) was 18th.
Before the final in Hockenheim in two weeks, there is even a pentathlon for the title on paper: Van der Linde (130), Auer (119), Rast (117), Preining (116) and Mirko Bortolotti (112) are only separated by 18 counters.
The qualification took place in poor weather conditions. The action on the wet track had to be ended several times with red flags. Engel secured pole position, behind him numerous penalties, some of which were carried over from the first Spielberg race, whirled up the starting grid.
DTM boss Berger satisfied
Van der Linde was hit hard in this respect even before qualifying. The South African was given a three-place penalty for his fourth, fifth and sixth violations of the track limit rule on Saturday. A total of nine places plus resulted in starting position 15 for the race on Sunday, which he then started with an early spin.
DTM boss Gerhard Berger was satisfied with the home event. The Tyrolean was stuck in traffic early in the morning on the short way from his hotel to the Ring, which he took as a good sign. “There will have been around 45,000 spectators (at the weekend; note). It’s a shame because of the rain on Sunday, otherwise there would have been even more spectators,” said Berger.
Source: Nachrichten
