More trouble with the Balance of Performance in the DTM: After Saturday’s race, following criticism from Emil Frey Ferrari at the Lausitzring two weeks ago, Abt Motorsport Director Martin Tomczyk was unusually clear about the classification of his team’s Audi R8 LMS GT3 evo 2. Like the five GT3 Lamborghinis in the field, the two Kempten-based cars had to be loaded with 15 kilograms overnight.
Not a correct classification, felt Tomczyk, who spoke of a bitter day: “For me, today showed that the BoP classification was not the right one. We had a lot of trouble maintaining our racing performance.” A remarkable criticism, given that dissatisfaction with the respective classification is usually expressed indirectly in order to avoid any possible disadvantages in the future.
Feller is passed in the race
In qualifying, things had initially looked acceptable for the Abts. Although the championship leader Kelvin van der Linde only finished 13th after his alternative strategy in qualifying, but Ricardo Feller placed his vehicle in the second row of the grid.
In the race, however, the battle for top positions was over pretty quickly. Already in the opening laps, Feller had to let Rene Rast go and then lost more and more contact with the leading quartet. After just 20 minutes, Feller was almost six seconds behind Rast in fourth place. The Swiss driver was pulling a train of cars behind him that stretched as far as Marco Wittmann in eleventh place.
Tomczyk sums up: Were the slowest manufacturer
“We were with the slowest manufacturer out there and ultimately had no chance of fighting anywhere,” said Tomczyk. In the pits, Feller lost another position after an undercut by Lucas Auer (Winward-Mercedes), and on the track the two Schubert-BMW cars of Sheldon van der Linde and Wittmann also left the 24-year-old behind until the finish. And Mirko Bortolotti (SSR-Lamborghini) also crossed the finish line just 0.393 seconds behind Feller.
Things didn’t go any better for Kelvin van der Linde. Despite two retirements ahead of him by Manthey-Porsche driver Ayhancan Güven and Maximilian Paul (Paul-Lamborghini), the South African only managed 13th place. The six-time DTM winner was unable to put any pressure on the front runners, but instead had to defend himself in the final laps against a train of three cars led by defending champion Thomas Preining.
Will Abt-Audi BoP adjustments come to the rescue for Sunday?
“When we saw the others who were simply seconds faster per lap, that didn’t work for me,” said Tomczyk, underlining his criticism of the BoP. Stephane Ratel’s company SRO has been responsible for the BoP since the ADAC took over the DTM before the 2023 season.
After today’s race, the ADAC service provider can adjust the Balance of Performance again for Sunday’s race in Zandvoort. Kelvin van der Linde and Ricardo Feller will tackle this from seventh and ninth places on the grid. Tomczyk is also hoping for adjustments: “I hope that we have better opportunities tomorrow and there is no giving up, but it’s a shame to go into a race like this.”
Abt criticism follows BoP complaint from Emil Frey Ferrari
In the championship, however, Abt-Audi is still leading in both classifications. In the drivers’ classification, Abt can even be pleased with a one-two lead after Preining’s poor points tally. Van der Linde leads with 66 points, five points ahead of Feller. Abt’s biggest competitor is Saturday’s winner Jack Aitken with 59 points. In the team classification, Abt-Audi’s lead over Winward-Mercedes has shrunk to 18 points.
The BoP criticism of the 2011 DTM champion comes just two weeks after the sharp classification criticism of Emil Frey Ferrari at the Lausitzring. The Swiss racing team had blamed this for the third-weakest points haul of the ten teams at the race in Brandenburg. You can read all the details in this article: