Marco Wittmann in the #11 BMW Team RMG M4 DTM won on Saturday and finished on the podium on Sunday when the DTM series ran at the Nürburgring on September 10 and 11. As a result he retained his DTM drivers’ points lead with four races remaining in the 2016 season.
Wittmann led all the way on Saturday with BMW Team RBM’s Tom Blomqvist finishing just behind him in second. Timo Glock (Team RMG) finished fifth and Maxime Martin (Team RBM) finished eighth.
On Sunday Wittmann fended off a late-race charge by Audi racer Mattias Ekstrom to finish third in a race won by Audi’s Edoardo Mortara. Bruno Spengler (BMW Team MTEK finished sixth and Blomqvist finished eighth.
After Sunday’s race BMW motorsports director Jens Marquardt said, “As expected, it was a tough race. However, you could see that Marco Wittmann can also keep his nerve when the going gets tough. He drove an extremely intelligent race, used the pace he had and claimed the third spot on the podium. This was the 250th podium finish for BMW in the DTM – that makes this result another very special one. As well as Marco, we also had another two cars in the top ten. This was not easy, given the weight we had on board today. However, we saw a great race with good maneuvers. There were also a few unnecessary incidents, but I guess that is part and parcel of motor racing. All in all, the weekend went very well for us. Marco tightened his grip on the lead in the Drivers’ Championship thanks to his win and third place. We are now looking forward to an exciting finale. I think we leave the Nürburgring with a very positive result and can start preparing for Budapest.”
Just four races remain in the 2016 season; the two rounds on the Hungaroring near Budapest will be run on September 24 and 25, and the final rounds will be run at Hockenheim on October 15 and 16.—Brian S. Morgan
