Mortara wins tempestuous DTM race at Lausitzring

After a crash at the start, safety car and race stoppage, Edoardo Mortara takes his first DTM win at the Lausitzring

• Edoardo Mortara (SILBERPFEIL Energy Mercedes-AMG Motorsport) secures his ninth victory in the DTM and his first in the Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM
• Five Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM drivers in the Top Ten: Lucas Auer (Mercedes-Benz Motorsport SILBERPFEIL), Paul Di Resta (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport REMUS), Pascal Wehrlein (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS) and Gary Paffett ( Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS) finish fourth, sixth, eighth and ninth respectively
• Mercedes-AMG lead constructors’ classification after three races with 157 points to BMW’s 125 and Audi’s 39
• Edoardo Mortara: “This is a very special victory for me – my first with Mercedes. We had a great strategy today. The car was good and the pit stop was superb too.”
• Ulrich Fritz: “Congratulations to Edo on his first victory with Mercedes. He has worked hard for this and fully deserves it.”

Mercedes-AMG Motorsport continue to do well at the Lausitzring. Edoardo Mortara (SILBERPFEIL Energy Mercedes-AMG Motorsport) won the first round of the second race weekend of the 2018 DTM season this Saturday. This was Edoardo’s ninth victory in the DTM, his first at the Lausitzring and first in the Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM. The Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM Team have now achieved 14 wins in all at this track, making it the most successful brand at the Lausitzring.

Five of the six Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM drivers – Edoardo, Gary Paffett, Paul Di Resta, Pascal Wehrlein and Lucas Auer – have now won at least one race at the Lausitzring with three of them (Di Resta, Wehrlein, Auer) having taken their first ever wins in the DTM there.

Overall, five Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM drivers achieved points-scoring finishes at the Lausitzring. Lucas Auer (SILBERPFEIL Energy Mercedes-AMG Motorsport) led the race for a long time after his pole position and finally finished fourth, narrowly missing the podium. Paul Di Resta (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport REMUS) crossed the finish line behind him in sixth place.

Pascal Wehrlein (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS) and Gary Paffett (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS) rounded off a strong team performance in eighth and ninth place respectively. Daniel Juncadella (Mercedes-AMG Motorsport REMUS) finished the third race of the season in 14th place after 21 laps.

The race was stopped briefly and restarted behind the safety car just after the start when René Rast (Audi) had a bad smash. The drivers were then left with around 20 minutes racing time for a sprint to the finish. It was particularly important over the final laps to get the timing of the mandatory pit stop right and to properly manage tyres.

Looking ahead to race 2: The fourth round of the 2018 DTM season starts on Sunday at 13:30 CEST (live on SAT.1 at 13:00 CEST). Third practice will take place before that at 09:00 CEST followed by the second qualifying at 11:25 CEST. During each race weekend, we will provide live timing data, live commentary, fan voting and exclusive behind-the-scenes videos of the Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM Team on our website at: www.mercedes-amg-motorsport.com/dtm.

Comments after the race

Edoardo Mortara (31, Italy):

• P1
• Car number: 48
• Team: SILBERPFEIL Energy Mercedes-AMG Motorsport
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“This is a very special victory for me – my first with Mercedes. We’ve struggled a lot last year, but this season, things are going a lot better for me, and I’ve at last been able to secure this victory. It’s incredible. I am well satisfied and absolutely delighted. We had a great strategy today. The car was good and the pit stop was superb too. I’m really ecstatic after this victory. My start was not perfect and the first laps were a bit difficult, but after that, everything went really well.”

Lucas Auer (23, Austria):

• P4
• Car number: 22
• Team: SILBERPFEIL Energy Mercedes-AMG Motorsport
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“That was a tough race with a lot of accidents. I hope that all the drivers involved are OK. I coped with everything until the final stage of the race. I was first after the start and the two restarts, and obviously that’s where I would have liked to stay. Ultimately, though, I finished fourth, and that was because the course of the race was affected by the late pit stops. It’s obviously deeply disappointing to drop back from P1 to P4. We now need to analyse how that happened. As a rule, you have to take every chance you get in the DTM. My pole position today was a miracle lap that can’t simply be repeated at the touch of a button. Tomorrow is a new day, but it’s going to be another tough one.”

Paul Di Resta (32, Scotland):

• P6
• Car number: 3
• Team: Mercedes-AMG Motorsport REMUS
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“It’s a bit of a shame really. I made a very good start, but the race was unpredictable. We didn’t quite get the best call when we had to split everything 50:50 – some went long while others went short. Obviously, long worked for Edo, and congratulations to him. For me, it was kind of level, whereas other guys came off worse. I think that, on balance, we can feel satisfied, but it could have been much better with a straightforward race.”

Pascal Wehrlein (23, Germany):

• P8
• Car number: 94
• Team: Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“I’m not satisfied with this race. Unfortunately, we lost too many positions during the pit stop. After that, there was also a contact with Gary when we came out of the box with cold tyres. That’s why it was not a good race for me. I feel that I could have got a lot more out of it. But fortunately, tomorrow is another race, and I’ll be back in full attack mode.”

Gary Paffett (37, England):

• P9
• Car number: 2
• Team: Mercedes-AMG Motorsport PETRONAS
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“The result was due to a bad qualifying, to be honest. P14 on the grid simply wasn’t good enough, and I need to do better tomorrow. The car was good today. So, yes, I’m disappointed with my qualifying. The race itself was crazy, though, with the safety car at the start and then René’s massive crash. Thankfully, he’s OK. Then the red flag. It was just a messy race and with so few racing laps, it is just very hard to make any gain on the guys at the front. We were in the pack at the front but towards the back of it. Anyway, I finished ninth and scored a few points, so we just have to try again tomorrow.”

Daniel Juncadella (26, Spain):

• P14
• Car number: 23
• Team: Mercedes-AMG Motorsport REMUS
• Car: Mercedes-AMG C 63 DTM

“There’s not much to say about today, unfortunately. I got a penalty and still don’t know why. My pace in the race was good after that, but it’s both very strange and quite annoying that things didn’t go so well earlier in qualifying. I’m now going to focus on the second race tomorrow.”

Ulrich Fritz, Head of Mercedes-AMG Motorsport DTM:

“First and foremost, what really matters today is that René is OK. Congratulations to Edo on his first victory with Mercedes. He has worked hard for this and fully deserves it. It was obviously a tempestuous race today with a lot happening. Congratulations to the team!”

Race results: Top Ten

Drivers‘ Championship

Manufacturers‘ Championship

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