Jamie Green topped the times in the third day of Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters testing in Barcelona. Audi’s new signing was 0.065 seconds faster than Mercedes’ DTM newcomer Pascal Wehrlein.
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Green’s best time of 1:07.171 was more than a second slower than the fastest time set on Wednesday, a 1:06.149 set by Gary Paffett.
Young German Wehrlein was second quickest, outpacing his more experienced stablemates at Mercedes-Benz. Spaniard Roberto Merhi ended the day third fastest, still less than a tenth (0.095 seconds) slower than Green.
“It was a good day,” said Green, who changes to Audi from Mercedes-Benz. “We could go through with our plan and do everything that we had today on the list. That’s a nice feeling. The track was dry and there were no interruptions and no technical problems. We have driven many miles – in the afternoon alone over 100 laps. That is very important to me at the moment. One thing helsp a lot to get a feel for the Audi RS5 DTM: a lot of laps. The same goes for working with my race engineer and my data engineer – therefore the tests were in Barcelona are a good opportunity.”
Green added that he is impressed with the new DRS (drag reduction system) that the DTM is testing in Spain this week.
“The DRS wing makes a positive impression,” admitted Green. “The effect will not be as large as in the formula 1, and the overtaking not easy. But DRS will help with overtaking. Also we’ve learned a lot about the option tires, which are much faster than the standard tires.”
Outside the top three, Adiren Tambay was fourth fastest, ahead of the third Mercedes of Christian Vietoris in fifth.
Dirk Werner was BMW’s best-placed driver in sixth, despite the marque fielding one more car than its rivals during today’s testing. Mike Rockenfeller was seventh, ahead of the BMW trio of Andy Priaulx, Joey Hand and newly-promoted BMW race driver Marco Wittmann.
Filipe Albuquerque finished the day as the slowest driver, just as his Team Rosberg team-mate Edoardo Mortara had on Wednesday.