DTM Lausitzring: Audi Sport quotes

Dieter Gass (Head of DTM at Audi Sport): “You don’t get to see a one-two-three-four win in the DTM very of­ten. That we even had five of our cars at the front on Sun­day crowns a per­fect DTM week­end for Audi – par­tic­u­larly on a track we were fre­quently hav­ing some dif­fi­cul­ties with in the past. This shows how strong the Audi RS 5 DTM is. Fol­low­ing his vic­tory at Hock­en­heim, Jamie Green seems to have fi­nally made his break­through. On Sun­day, he took the pole po­si­tion with an ad­van­tage of more than half a sec­ond. That’s rare in the DTM as well. Plus, he had to bat­tle for his vic­tory against strong com­pe­ti­tion within the squad. Af­ter this week­end, we re­ally have a rea­son to cel­e­brate, but we also know how quickly the ta­bles can turn again in the DTM. Our home round at the Noris­ring in four weeks from now will lit­er­ally be a heavy chal­lenge be­cause we’ll have to add even more weight to our cars.”
Jamie Green (Hoffmann Group Audi RS 5 DTM #53) Position 1 / position 1
“A fan­tas­tic week­end, ar­guably the best one in my ca­reer. Two vic­to­ries, a com­mand­ing best time in qual­i­fy­ing with a half-sec­ond ad­van­tage, plus the fastest lap in both races – you can hardly achieve more than that. I was fast at the Lausitzring be­fore, but this year I’ve upped the ante. It was a mega job by every­one in­volved. The Audi RS 5 DTM seems to be tai­lor-made for me this year. Now I’m look­ing for­ward to trav­el­ing to the Noris­ring as the leader of the stand­ings. It’s one of my fa­vorite tracks.”
Mattias Ekström (Red Bull Audi RS 5 DTM #5) Position 3 / position 2
“I must have been at the Lausitzring 50 times in my ca­reer – in­clud­ing tests. And I of­ten went home with my head hang­ing be­cause some­thing did­n’t fit or we weren’t fast enough. This time, it’s to­tally dif­fer­ent, be­cause even though I ob­vi­ously would have pre­ferred win­ning my­self, I’m happy about our strong per­for­mance as a team. I’m al­ways re­ally im­pressed about the fans at the Lausitzring. I don’t know if I ever did any­thing spe­cial, but the peo­ple are al­ways in­cred­i­bly friendly and warm to me. If I could state a wish it would be to have even more time for our spec­ta­tors in the fu­ture.”

Edoardo Mortara (Castrol EDGE Audi RS 5 DTM #48) Position 2 / position 5
“This DTM sea­son is re­ally great fun: four races, four times in the top five and two of them on podium. But the fact that Audi has given us a real win­ning car in the RS 5 DTM is a lot more im­por­tant. Every­one knows that we won’t be cel­e­brat­ing suc­cess like the one at the Lausitzring every week­end. But every one of us has the op­por­tu­nity to win races and to bat­tle for the cham­pi­onship – 14 more times this sea­son. In a cou­ple of days from now, the open­ing of my sec­ond restau­rant in Geneva is on my agenda, plus plenty of train­ing and, ob­vi­ously, look­ing for­ward to one of the sea­son’s high­lights at the Nurem­berg Noris­ring.”

Miguel Molina (Teufel Audi RS 5 DTM #17) Position 4 / position 3
“This has been the first week­end that I’ve re­ally been in con­tention at the Lausitzring. Pole on Sat­ur­day and a podium on Sun­day – the only thing that was miss­ing was a vic­tory. I’m happy with my per­for­mance. Jamie (Green) and Mat­tias (Ek­ström) are in a class of their own – but catch­ing up with them is my next goal. Maybe al­ready at the Noris­ring. The time un­til then won’t be bor­ing. I’m go­ing to train a lot, plus round two in the Span­ish Kart Cham­pi­onship is com­ing up in which I’m tak­ing care of a team. The opener went well and now we’re aim­ing for our first vic­tory.”

Timo Scheider (AUTO TEST Audi RS 5 DTM #10) Position 8 / position 4
“We worked for our suc­cess this week­end. On Sat­ur­day, the set-up of the car and my dri­ving style did­n’t fit to­gether yet. We made some changes for Sun­day and re­warded our­selves with grid po­si­tion three and fourth place in the race. For Audi, the event at the Lausitzring has now been the sec­ond per­fect week­end. Still, we’re not get­ting any­thing for free. In qual­i­fy­ing, the cars in po­si­tions two to 24 were only within five tenths of a sec­ond – that clearly shows how close the bat­tle is in the DTM. Two com­mand­ing vic­to­ries like these on a track that did­n’t suit us re­ally well in the past prob­a­bly amazed a lot of peo­ple. And, hon­estly speak­ing, we were a lit­tle amazed our­selves. Now the Noris­ring is com­ing up where we haven’t re­ally been look­ing good for a long time ei­ther. We’d like to cause an­other sur­prise there.”

Nico Müller (Audi Financial Services Audi RS 5 DTM #51) Position 20 / position 9
“If you weigh the pos­i­tives against the neg­a­tives, my Lausitz week­end with two points on Sun­day just barely ends up in the pos­i­tive range. I don’t have a lot of ex­pe­ri­ence on this track yet be­cause my first run at the Lausitzring last year lasted only ten laps. There was more po­ten­tial in round two, but in the DTM every­thing’s got to per­fectly fit if you want to be fur­ther in front. Audi is ex­tremely strong this year and my Ros­berg team has al­ready scored three in four vic­to­ries with Jamie. So it promises to be­come an ex­cit­ing year. Af­ter the 24-hour race at the Nür­bur­gring and the DTM I’m now look­ing for­ward to a breather. Then we’re trav­el­ing to the Noris­ring – that’s a high­light for me be­cause I’m a big fan of city street cir­cuits.”

Mike Rockenfeller (Schaeffler Audi RS 5 DTM #99) Position 9 / position 10
“Con­grat­u­la­tions to Audi and my brand col­leagues who re­ally scored big at the Lausitzring. Ob­vi­ously, I’m any­thing but happy with po­si­tions nine and ten. I’ve got to chalk that up to ex­pe­ri­ence and see what I can learn from it. Our car is top and I’m go­ing to bat­tle to put all the fac­tors to­gether again as soon as pos­si­ble. There are still 14 more races to go and vic­to­ries con­tinue to be my goal. The Noris­ring is a spe­cial event be­cause it’s the home round for Audi and for our part­ner Scha­ef­fler. Be­fore Nurem­berg, I’ll be at Le Mans with the squad as a re­serve dri­ver. Ob­vi­ously, I’m hop­ing that there’ll be no need for me to run there but I’m go­ing to sup­port the guys as best I can.”

Adrien Tambay (Playboy Audi RS 5 DTM #27) Position 16 / position 20
“This must have been the cru­elest week­end in my DTM ca­reer. The be­gin­ning was re­ally bad be­cause I had to start from the rear of the grid due to an en­gine re­pair. On Sun­day, I gave every­thing to some­what re­cover. Things were look­ing good for a long time be­cause I had sev­eral good over­tak­ing ma­neu­vers and had al­ready re­cov­ered to ninth place when I was turned around by a ri­val. So my per­sonal 2015 DTM sea­son will only re­ally start at the Noris­ring. Now I’m go­ing to spend some time with friends and es­pe­cially with my fam­ily. That’s the best way for me to clear my mind again.”