2013 Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisters (DTM)

  • Thread starter MatskiMonk
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I've captured the moment of Spengler spinning out. :crazy:
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EDIT: Rockenfeller just finished 1st:
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The DTM race is about to start at the Nurburgring, in other news the rain is about to start at the Nurburgring...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_S3KFtFXkdk

Rockenfeller got took down to last at the first corner by Joey Hand and is now flying through the pack, the only driver on wet tyres!

Adrien Tambay is having an even better race though, he overtook half the grid into turn 1 and is flying in 2nd place now.
 
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I'm still trying to work through watching the race (working on Sundays sucks fat hairy balls), but by lap 7 I had to unload onto the forums.

Forgive me for being an American and watching DTM races several hours after they've aired on Youtube. I'm currently 7 laps (of 49) into this morning's Nurburgring race and I've already seen more excitement in less than 10 laps than in an entire season of racing on uninspired, boring "motorsport park" tracks. I'm not saying the 'Ring's GP track isn't boring, it's probably the worst offender of them all considering the fantastic Nordschleife it tags onto.

This race has been exciting just because of the rain and what it's done to the field!

I'm a huge BMW fan and watching Mike Rockenfeller only get to P11 in qualifying was somewhat tempered by Bruno Spengler not doing much better and ending in P10. My spirits rose when i watched Augusto Farfus and Marco Wittman (the newcomer I can't help but love) get P1 and P2 respectively for BMW.

Enter rain. Right at the start into the turn 1 hairpin, Rockenfeller gets taken out by a self-sacrificing BMW driver (thanks Joey Hand), which drops him nearly to last in field, he gets a couple of spots back when more cars spun out in turn 2, but he's off Spengler's tail so I'm happy, right?

**** got real in the next few laps. Safety car comes out, Rocky dives into the pits earlier than anyone else (before the official pit window opened, actually) and puts on the wets while everyone else is still out in slicks. He comes out and is immediately dominating, passing cars left and right, by lap 4 he's already gone from dead last to 14th. Lap 5, pit lane officially opens and everyone dives in including Farfus who managed to hold on to P1 but Wittman stays out keeping a BMW up front for us until the very next lap when he biffs a corner and runs into the barrier. I still don't know if he got out of there. Guess I'll find out.

Now Rocky's 5th right back behind Spengler who's moved up to 4th due to the pit entry and Wittman's rookie mistake. This is all bad news. Rocky's on wets, Bruno's on slicks, and sure enough by the next go 'round Rocky's passed Bruno and the two cars left in front of them pit, Bruno pits and bam! Mike Rockenfeller is P1 where he's been many a time the last few races and my dreams of seeing him toppled from the top of the driver points race may be crushed. Granted, I've got 42 more laps of racing to watch, Farfus got out of the pits in time to be P3 and Rockenfeller's first pit didn't count because it was before the pit window, so he's still got to do two more pit stops to everyone else's 1.

I just needed someplace to share why my heart is racing right now, don't mind me guys.

MatskiMonk
Pretty much only a cosmetic difference though... Although.. It will be a damn sexy cosmetic difference!!
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Meh, it's gonna look great. Not quite disappointed that it's only a cosmetic difference, but I'm definitely disappointed no gt3/gt3 m4 will be around yet. Now THAT would look sick and not be a silhouette car. Not that the Z4s don't look great.
 
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This needs embedding to show Robert Wickens awesomeness




eDirtyTati
I'm still trying to work through watching the race (working on Sundays sucks fat hairy balls), but by lap 7 I had to unload onto the forums.
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Why would you go into a DTM thread when you're watching a race? (Edit: After it's finished I mean) Doesn't it just ruin the suspense if you know the results?
 
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*flag in info*<------ I'm feeling so much pride right now.


That Canadian can drive! He's the best reason to watch DTM. :sly: And, when I met him, he seemed to be a nice guy, too.
 
GOTMAXPOWER
Why would you go into a DTM thread when you're watching a race? (Edit: After it's finished I mean) Doesn't it just ruin the suspense if you know the results?
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Usually wouldn't, but I messed around and logged into facebook that morning and had the results ruined for me by BMW Motorsport's page. I was screwed before I even hit youtube. :grumpy: Doesn't make the actual racing any less exciting though.
 
Not impressed one bit.....

Much as it pains me, I have to congratulate Audi for a job well done this weekend, 8 cars in the top 10! Okay, so Gustl got the win, I'm pleased about that, but seriously BMW Motorsport boss Jens Marquardt needs to get a handle on this current decline in BMWs form. Drivers like Tomczyk (former DTM champion), Andy Priaulx and Joey Hand are top class drivers, the reigning champ Spengler also wears the blue and white roundel... And yet week after week at the moment we're reading about disappointing results for them, bad luck, and frustration. I think this showed today when Spengler retaliated against Wickens - don't get me wrong, Wickens 'pass' was disgusting... But Spengler took himself out of the running today.

Things can't be too good in the BMW camp at the moment - last year we took all three titles... After Audi's performance today we might well finish this year with NO titles, despite having two more cars this time around - with an F1 driver and promising youngster on board too.

I suspect morale is bad in all but one of the BMW garages... And this won't help turn around the performance of its drivers.

Thank The Lord for Augusto Farfus! Having briefly met him at Brands Hatch I'm really pleased that he's doing well, and much as I hate team politics in Motorsport, BMW need to get every single one of their drivers to line up behind in defence of his position to minimise the embarrassing hit it looks like BMW will take this year.

Seriously, is a massive amount of respect for BMW Motorsport but the fact is since the withdrawal from F1 (a decision I still support) and the withdrawal from factory touring car program's, things have gotten a little raggedy... The DTM titles last year were great, but it's basically one national championship... Both of our competitors have full scale program's in other motor sports - Mercedes are having some success now in F1, and Audi of course have their Le Mans efforts... Both Marques also supply GT racers to customer teams (as do BMW) and obviously they all have DTM, but for BMW, DTM is the flagship motorsport, the performance at the moment isn't good enough, and that makes me sad.

... Of course I will continue to support them, but I think it's fair to say they are not meeting their fans expectations at the moment.
 
After today I've lost quite a lot of respect towards Spengler :/. I know Wickens was a little hot going into the first and second turn but seriously that "rubbing" caused no substantial damage to any of the cars. And then Spengler behaved like a child and had to run into the back of Rob corner later... taking each other out of the race. That was really lame in my opinion. It looked like a dirty race on GT5...

On the side note I must admit Rocky deserves the title 100%. He's driving very well each race getting a lot of points whilst at it.

P.S. Seems like Farfus has become the best current BMW driver by a long way. Tomczyk is still driving terribly...
 
They were both acting like children. Wickens dove in and tried to muscle through, not once but twice. I'm not defending what Spengler did, but I would have been steaming as well. In the end, both retired from the race and that's what they deserved for their spat.

Good job Augusto!! I hate to dwell on it, but if Farfus hadn't lost that 2nd place through gearbox failure in Brands Hatch, the gap for the championship would be only 15 points instead of the current 33 points. But I guess you can also point to that pace slump at Lausitz to Norisring (and Spielberg to a lesser extent) as to where he lost his chance for it. Nevertheless, it's good to see him finish the season strong.
 
I agree with Sagaris. Both Wickens and Spengler are to blame. As Spengler said though, if Wickens wants to play hard ball, he's gotta be able to take the hits back. Spengler's move was no different from his. And I'm sure if Rob had had a little patience, Bruno would have gotten the blue flag as he clearly didn't have any pace to stay in the top 10. Once he tossed the prime tire on he was slower than all but the least talented drivers in the field. Team Schnitzer should have spent a little more time optimizing his setup for both tires.

By the way, this was probably the most exciting race this season in a while as far as overtakes. I was starting to get bored.
 
Best moment of the race so far is that a marshall deployed the onboard fire extinguisher while Werner was still in the car. :lol:
 
Rockenfeller is 2013 champion. Werner had to be taken off in the ambulance after the fire extinguisher incident, hope he's ok.
 
Yep, not happy about that. Congrats to Farfus on the win. Congrats to Rocky for the title - it would have taken a lot of bad luck for him not to have won this, escaping a jump start penalty and potential unsafe pit release didn't hurt either though!
 
There was never much of a championship battle in the first place. Once one driver gets a big lead, all drivers driving for that manufacturer start bending over for their leader and with Audi being so strong lately and Merc being nowhere, the championship result became a foregone conclusion. The championship was lost for Farfus when BMW dropped those 18 points at Brand Hatch.

Congrats to Rockenfeller, he is a deserving champion.
 
Horrible strategy by BMW (or Schnitzer) putting Wittman on the primes at the beginning knowing he needed to hang onto Farfus to defend against Rocky. The race was lost there. I don't know much about testing the options before a race though so maybe they had no idea that the primes would be so far behind the pace. If it were only a second or two, it could have worked to keep Rocky backed up enough for Farfus to build up a lead while still giving Wittman a fighting chance at defending. But with such a huge difference there was no way. The move Rocky put on him to get past was hilarious. He just caught the rookie out there holding his _____, if you will.

That being said, a jump start and unsafe pit release without penalty strikes me as extremely unfair. Even if you discount the jump start as just extremely great timing, the pit release in front of Joey Hand merited a drive through.
 
eDirtyTati
Horrible strategy by BMW (or Schnitzer) putting Wittman on the primes at the beginning knowing he needed to hang onto Farfus to defend against Rocky.
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Wittmann drives for BMW Team MTek, not Schnitzer - Schnitzer just had their own nightmare weekend.

I'm not sure it would have helped, if Marco would have tried to back Rocky up, he'd have been passed for sure, Rocky got more laps from his tyres, so the chances are both Farfus and Wittmann would have pitted from the first two positions, allowed Rocky to jump them in the pits, and then both be chasing - I think the strategy fell apart once Rocky had another Audi acting as rear gunner and Wittmann lost all his pace.

BMW didn't have the pace to control the race like they needed to, too many Audi's in the top 10.
 
Season finale!​
Hockenheim​

Mike Rockenfeller has won the drivers championship, but the Manufacturers and Teams titles are up for grabs, with BMW trailing Audi by a handful of points in each.

BMW pretty much owned qualifying with all 4 cars in the shootout being BMW's, notably Andy Priaulx and Timo Glock putting in unusually good performances.

Race Video from DTM International on YouTube.



Going to be a tense race!
 

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