During race one for the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters earlier on today, the coming together of Mercedes’ Paul Di Resta and BMW’s Tom Blomqvist on lap 14 at turn four saw both drivers have their respective races compromised.
The Scot exited out of pit lane after his mandatory stop, coming out in front of Blomqvist and the Audi Sport pair of Mike Rockenfeller and Jamie Green, as the BMW driver attempted to overtake the Mercedes driver around the outside of turn four.
Di Resta, who later admitted fault in light of the incident, went close to the apex of turn four, before the car appeared to slide into the right rear of Blomqvist’s M4 DTM.
“DTM is close racing. I didn’t really expect Blomqvist to try it on the outside. On cold tyres with no tyre blankets, that’s what we expected. I was at fault, because I locked an inside wheel. I touched his back and made him spin,” said the 2010 champion, who had no choice but to accept a drive-through penalty shortly afterwards.
The Mercedes driver, who is currently 13th in the standings on 12 points, knows that with the performances current leader Lucas Auer has shown, clearly dictates that if all goes well, he may find some results coming his way.
“Now we need to reset tonight and try to come back and at least get on the podium tomorrow if we can. But it’s been a tough weekend until now. Still, tomorrow is another day, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”
Blomqvist, who qualified in sixth for the opening race of the weekend, suffered another non-score finish for the third race in a row, classing this afternoon as “a race to forget for me.”
“One lap after my stop, Paul di Resta came out of the pit lane on cold tyres. I knew that it could get tight on turn four and I tried to leave plenty of room,” explained the Team RBM driver, who along with Loïc Duval and Augusto Farfus, has yet to score points this year.
“He had some understeer and turned me, even though I had left enough space. I was in last place after that and couldn’t do anything else.”