Luca Stolz scored his maiden DTM win in Sunday’s race at Nurburgring. The 27-year-old scored a home win for Mercedes-AMG Team HRT, based in the Nürburgring business park in Meuspath. In an intense race, Norwegian Dennis Olsen came second with the SSR Performance Porsche while the winner of the season opener, Lucas Auer was on the podium after finishing third in his Winward AMG in the 90th DTM race at the Nürburgring.
“Finally! Finally!,” a jubilant Luca Stolz said on the radio after crossing the finish line, one year after his guest drive in DTM at the same venue. “It is fantastic! The pit stop was decisive. Thanks to all of you,” said Stolz, who promised his crew a beer crate.
In the championship standings, Sheldon van der Linde, a three-time race winner this season who only finished ninth in the Sunday race, defended his lead with 110 points. “After the restart following the safety car intervention, my race was basically over. Even though there are still six races remaining, I am confident for the title battle, we have a strong car,” the BMW driver of the Schubert Motorsport team said.
With 89 points, Mirko Bortolotti remains in second place, although the Lamborghini works driver was a bit too eager in the battle for fourth against Kelvin van der Linde in the closing stages of the Sunday race, like he had been on Saturday already against Felipe Fraga on Saturday. As a result, he casually lost a possible total of 28 points over the weekend. Auer, now at 85 points, moved ahead of René Rast into third place, Luca Stolz is now fifth in the standings with 73 points.
Qualifying on Sunday morning already produced the first sensation of the day: 20 cars were within only 0.326 seconds, a proof for the incredibly close competition in the 2022 DTM! And like in the race on Saturday, the van der Linde brothers stood out: Sheldon van der Linde claimed pole position with the Schubert BMW, his brother Kelvin was one hundredth of a second slower in what was the closest qualifying of the season so far and secured second place on the grid. Mirko Bortolotti was fourth-fastest, but he started ninth following a penalty from the previous day due to the collision with race leader Felipe Fraga.
With the field of 28 GT race cars, and in excellent summer weather, in sharp contrast to the previous day, from fifth on the grid, Philipp Eng skilfully moved up into second behind his teammate Sheldon van der Linde, with Dennis Olsen in the SSR Porsche, Thomas Preining in the KÜS Team Bernhard Porsche and Luca Stolz in the HRT Mercedes-AMG next up while Kelvin van der Linde had lost some ground.
On lap four, David Schumacher with the WINWARD Mercedes-AMG tangled with the ABT Audi of René Rast in the final corner, after which the latter’s car slid into the gravel bed.
Both drivers retired and the incident prompted a safety car intervention. “I was taken out, like yesterday. Like this, it is no fun,” the three-time DTM champion ranted. Like often in DTM, the restart considerably mixed up the order in the field. After a perfect pit stop, Stolz found himself in the lead from Olsen, Lucas Auer, Kelvin van der Linde and Bortolotti, who benefitted from this part of the race, while Sheldon van der Linde massively lost out in tenth place. Out in front, Luca Stolz extended his lead more and more and brought his maiden win home in a commanding way, followed home by Olsen and Auer.
