Edoardo Mortara has taken his first-ever win in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters at the Red Bull Ring in Austria and Audi’s first of 2012. BMW’s Martin Tomczyk finished in second, with Gary Paffett finishing third.
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From pole position Mortara was able to control the entire race to take Audi’s first win in the 2012 DTM. BMW’s Tomczyk finished in second, despite applying intense pressure to the Italian in front.
Mercedes driver Paffett further extended his championship lead, which now stands at 36 points, by finishing in third. The Brit had only one serious chance to take the lead, on lap 30, as Mortara rejoined the circuit following his pit-stop. The Audi driver defended his position strongly, keeping Paffett behind. The Brit would lose out on the follow lap as Tomczyk rejoined from his pit-stop in between the duo.
Audi’s Mattias Ekström finished in fourth, having never really been in a position to challenge for the win despite finishing within three seconds of winner Mortara. Jamie Green finished in fifth for Mercedes and as the last driver of the lead quintet.
Timo Scheider had an eventful race, coming from 16th on the grid to finish in sixth, some 35 seconds off the leaders. On the eighth lap the German was forced into the gravel after contact from Augusto Farfus, but was able to continue albeit significantly down the order. He put in a superb drive thereafter to claim his best result of the season and move into 9th in the championship.
Mike Rockenfeller finished in seventh, just ahead of Filipe Albuquerque in eighth, the Portugese racer’s best result of the season thus far. Taking his first points of the season in ninth was BMW’s Joey Hand, whilst Farfus completed the top ten.
Missing out on the points were four of Mercedes’ drivers, with Ralf Schumacher missing out for the second race in a row in 11th. Roberto Merhi’s 12th placed finish and Robert Wicken’s 13th were their best of the season so far. Susie Wolff finished as the best of the female racers in 14th, just ahead of Rahel Frey who had earlier received a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pit lane.
Bruno Spengler retired from the race after 33 laps, whilst running outside of the points. The Canadian had been struggling with the handling of his car after getting caught up in a first lap incident and his retirement drops him from second to fourth in the championship.
The safety car was called upon in the early stages of the race after Adrien Tambay went straight on at the second corner and Christian Vietoris ended up in the barriers following a collision with Andy Priaulx. The Brit would complete the lap, but only to pit due to the damage sustained to his car. Fellow BMW driver Dirk Werner’s miserable run of from in 2012 continued as he was caught up in the chaos, retiring on the opening lap.