Racing News

    A Procar M1 and an E30 M3 DTM car will run as “race taxis” at all ten DTM races this season. The two cars will run between practice and qualifying on Saturday, and before the race on Sunday. Both cars are from the BMW Group's BMW Classic collection.

     
    The M3 is like the one that Eric van de Poele drove to the 1987 DTM title, 25 years before Bruno Spengler won the 2012 title in a new M3 DTM. The M1 dates to 1980, when Nelson Piquet drove it in the Procar series, which served as warm-up races to two seasons of Formula 1 competition.

    While most DTM spectators will watch the M1 and M3 from the stands, a chosen few will get rides in the cars. BMW’s release says, “With experienced motorsport professionals at the wheel, selected visitors will be able to experience the fascination of a DTM race at close hand.”

    The “experienced motorsport professionals” will be drivers from the era when the cars were run; the eight current DTM drivers will not be eligible, because, as BMW explains, “the DTM regulations rule that the extra experience of the track would give them an unfair competitive advantage.”

    The DTM season begins in Hockenheim on May 5.—Brian S. Morgan