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DTM wants to be the fastest GT3 series in 2021

The DTM is aiming to become the fastest GT3 championship in the world in 2021 with an aggressive use of the Balance of Performance system, according to the series’ technical chief.

Daniel Juncadella, GruppeM Racing, Mercedes AMG GT3

Daniel Juncadella, GruppeM Racing, Mercedes AMG GT3

DTM

Back in 2020 the ITR had laid down plans to upgrade GT3 cars as part of what it branded as the GT Pro formula, but it eventually settled for standard GT3 machinery in the face of opposition from manufacturers. 

However, the ITR is still keen on differentiating DTM from other established GT3 championships by beefing up the performance of the cars, this time by using the more cost-friendly BoP route.  

Although the final BoP for the DTM’s first season under GT3 regulations is yet to be determined by ITR’s partner AVL Racing, last week’s Hockenheim test gave a glimpse of what lap times to expect when the campaign gets underway at Monza in June.

Lucas Auer set a best time of 1m36.153s in the Winward Mercedes-AMG GT3 on the second day of running, a full three seconds quicker than the pole time in last years’ GT Masters qualifying at Hockenheim. Compared to Class One, the cars were about eight seconds slower.

It is understood that Mercedes was running the engine restrictor at minimal levels during testing, while Audi had no restrictor at all in its quartet of R8 LMS GT3s.

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In general, the current BoP settings in the DTM allows teams to run their engines in the region of 560bhp - 590bhp, much higher than the 520bhp limit in GT Masters and GT World Challenge Europe.

This has been made possible by the absence of a Porsche entry so far, as the 911 GT3 R is only capable of churning out 520bhp. Hence, unlike SRO-run championships, the DTM is not required to peg back the performance of other cars according to the power limitations of the Porsche.

“To be fair it’s April in Hockenheim so it’s low temperature and favourable ambient temperature so that helps in terms of engine performance, that gives a bit of a different picture,” Michael Resl, the director of competition and technology at ITR, said of the pace of the cars in the Hockenheim test.

“But naturally DTM strives to be the fastest GT3 series so our BoP is built to make cars as performant as possible and let them shine. But there is no specific high-speed BoP or anything for Hockenheim. It’s more to give teams a good basis to start testing.”

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