Spa: An almost perfect DTM weekend 🎥
NICO MÜLLER In the second DTM race at Spa, champion René Rast played to his well-known strengths. After leading for a long time, Nico Müller had to settle for second place but leads the standings. Fabio Scherer was also fast. The highlights of Sunday's DTM race at Spa show how René Rast and Nico Müller battled it out for victory [...]
The highlights of Sunday's DTM race at Spa show René Rast and Nico Müller battling it out for victory.
René Rast decided Sunday's DTM race at Spa-Francorchamps in his favor and thus successfully took revenge for the clear defeat the day before. While his Audi brand colleague Nico Müller defeated the reigning champion on Saturday with spirited maneuvers in "Eau Rouge" and "Raidillon," on Sunday it was Rast who set the decisive maneuver against Müller, who had been leading from the fourth lap, on the 21st lap at the end of the long Kemmel straight.
Two quintuple wins for Audi
The man from Berne stayed on Rast's heels until the chequered flag after 55 minutes plus one lap, but was beaten by 0.483 seconds. His attempt to counterattack again on the final lap failed because his DRS closed again after a slight spiral at the exit of "Eau Rouge" and could no longer be opened to flatten the rear wing and generate more top speed.
Third place went to the previous day's runner-up Robin Frijns (NL), who drives for Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline together with Müller. As on Saturday, the men of the rings managed a five-fold success. Competitor BMW has taken some homework with it from Belgium for the upcoming "double-header" at the Lausitzring (August 15/16 and 22/23).
Müller not completely satisfied
With Saturday's victory, Sunday's second place and the additional points for the respective top three from qualifying, Nico Müller will travel to the Lausitz next week as DTM leader of the standings after the conclusion of the Formula E championship.
However, he was not really satisfied after the almost perfect opening weekend - in fact, he has never been so unhappy about a second place...
Nico Müller: "I somehow have the feeling that I could have won the second race as well. René did that very cleverly on the last lap. I thought that his defensive maneuver would come earlier, so both my overtaking tools were given away too early. René brought all his experience to bear today. He deserved this win, but I deserved it too. Our pace was very good, the guys gave me a very good car. Robin was also extremely strong throughout the weekend. I hope we can keep our momentum going."
Faster Fabio Scherer
The fastest Audi driver in terms of top speed was Fabio Scherer. Like two BMW drivers after him, the DTM rookie from Engelberg achieved a top speed of 302 km/h with the RS5 fielded by Audi Team WRT.
He was in an excellent ninth place from lap 19 to 22 (of 26), but had to give up three positions in the final phase and thus missed out on his first points. With two twelfth-place finishes, Scherer was nevertheless the twice best-ranked of the four DTM rookies, which included ex-Sauber driver Robert Kubica on BMW (twice P14).
