The starting signal for the DTM highlight of the 2024 season has been given: On Friday morning, the engines of the GT3 cars roared for the first time on the famous Norisring. Around 120,000 spectators are expected at the only city race on the DTM calendar and will certainly not be deterred by a predicted rain shower on Saturday.
Friday in Nuremberg was all about free practice sessions to get used to the 2.162-kilometer-long course with its four corners. In the 55-minute session in the morning, Kelvin van der Linde was in the lead. The Abt Audi driver, championship leader and new German citizen, needed 49.340 seconds for his best lap along the Dutzendteich.
1st Norisring training: Kelvin van der Linde ahead of Nicki Thiim
Van der Linde took the lead from Rene Rast (Schubert-BMW) in the closing minutes of the uneventful practice session. The three-time DTM champion was pushed into third place by Nicki Thiim (SSR-Lamborghini) shortly before the chequered flag fell. Thiim, who won the 24 Hours of Spa last weekend, was only 0.016 seconds slower than leader van der Linde.
DTM training today: Top 16 within half a second
Rast followed in third place, seven thousandths of a second behind Thiim – the top 16 in the time list were separated by less than half a second on the shortest track on the calendar. Fourth place went to Franck Perera (GRT-Lamborghini), who is standing in for regular driver Christian Engelhart at the Grasser Racing Team. The Starnberger has to take a break from races number seven and eight of the season due to knee surgery and is expected to return to the Lambo cockpit for the next race.
Behind youngster Maximilian Paul (Paul-Lamborghini), Maro Engel (Winward-Mercedes) was the best-placed driver of a Mercedes-AMG GT3 in sixth place. The Benz faction received a 1.5 millimeter larger restrictor for the Norisring weekend. We will only find out how this affects the performance in the field in Qualifying 1 on Saturday morning at 9:00 a.m.
Ferrari and McLaren in the lower positions
In seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth place followed Sheldon van der Linde (Schubert-BMW), Luca Engstler (GRT-Lamborghini), Ayhancan Güven (Manthey-Porsche) and local hero Marco Wittmann in the third Schubert-BMW M4 GT3. The reigning DTM champion Thomas Preining could not get beyond P15 in his Manthey 911. Both Ferraris from Emil Frey Racing (Thierry Vermeulen P12, Jack Aitken P17) and the McLaren duo from newcomer Dörr Motorsport (Clemens Schmid P19, Ben Dörr P20) missed the top 10.
The second free practice session of the DTM will take place today from 3:45 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. – enough time before the kick-off of the European Championship quarter-final match between Germany and Spain in Stuttgart.