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Edition

Australia
Qualifying report

Lausitzring DTM: Van der Linde brothers lock out front row

Sheldon van der Linde put BMW on pole position for the first of the two DTM races at the Lausitzring, beating his elder brother Kelvin by just 0.027s.

Kelvin van der Linde, Abt Sportsline, Pole sitter Sheldon van der Linde, ROWE Racing

Kelvin van der Linde, Abt Sportsline, Pole sitter Sheldon van der Linde, ROWE Racing

Alexander Trienitz

Laptimes improved significantly over the course of the 20-minute session, with Kelvin van der Linde’s early benchmark of 1m31.371s in the Abt Sportsline Audi beaten by nearly the entire field.

HRT driver Vincent Abril, who was excluded from the Monza weekend over a fuel infringement, was the first to break the 1m31s barrier, setting the fastest time of the weekend with a 1m30.874s.

But then Red Bull junior Liam Lawson found even more time in the AF Corse-run Ferrari, ending the first runs on top with a 1m30.817s.

As the drivers returned to the track in the final five minutes, 2013 champion Mike Rockenfeller was the first to eclipse Lawson in the second of three Abt-run Audis, before Kelvin van der Linde improved to a 1m30.726s to make it an Audi 1-2 at the top of the timesheets.

Both van der Linde and Rockenfeller improved on their final flyers, reversing their positions at the top of the order, with Esteban Muth going third in the T3 Motorsport.

However, there was a late surprise when Rowe Racing’s Sheldon van der Linde went quickest with a last-gasp attempt of 1m30.537s, edging his brother by just 0.027s to claim his second pole position in the series.

Rockenfeller slipped to third in the final classification, 0.137s off the pace, with Muth the best of the Lamborghini runners in fourth.

Lawson managed to gain a tenth over his previous time on his last lap but that was only good for fifth on the grid, 0.207s behind van der Linde's chart-topping time.

FP1 pacesetter Arjun Maini was the top Mercedes driver in sixth in the GetSpeed-run AMG GT3, beating the second Red Bull-backed Ferrari of Alex Albon.

Timo Glock finished eighth after Rowe Racing elected to replace the drive-by-wire system on his car in favour of a conventional steering due to a faulty sensor.

Mercedes drivers occupied the next five spots on the grid, led by Winward driver Philip Ellis and Mucke Motorsport’s Maximilian Buhk, the latter subbing for the absent Gary Paffett for the second race weekend in a row.

Last year’s runner-up Nico Muller was surprisingly off the pace in the Team Rosberg Audi, finishing over seven tenths down on the polesitter in 16th, only ahead of Sophia Floersch, Esmee Hawkey and Dev Gore.

Qualifying results:

Cla # Driver Car Time Gap
1 31 South Africa Sheldon Van Der Linde
BMW M6 GT3 1'30.537
2 3 South Africa Kelvin van der Linde
Audi R8 LMS Evo 1'30.564 0.027
3 9 Germany Mike Rockenfeller
Audi R8 LMS Evo 1'30.674 0.137
4 10 Belgium Esteban Muth
Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 1'30.710 0.173
5 30 New Zealand Liam Lawson
Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo 2020 1'30.744 0.207
6 36 India Arjun Maini
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'30.756 0.219
7 23 Thailand Alex Albon
Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo 2020 1'30.860 0.323
8 16 Germany Timo Glock
BMW M6 GT3 1'30.869 0.332
9 57 United Kingdom Philip Ellis
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'30.874 0.337
10 18 Germany Maximilian Buhk
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'30.897 0.360
11 22 Austria Lucas Auer
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'30.940 0.403
12 5 France Vincent Abril
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'31.008 0.471
13 8 Spain Daniel Juncadella
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'31.041 0.504
14 11 Germany Marco Wittmann
BMW M6 GT3 1'31.052 0.515
15 4 Germany Maximilian Götz
Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo 1'31.097 0.560
16 51 Switzerland Nico Müller
Audi R8 LMS Evo 1'31.254 0.717
17 99 Germany Sophia Flörsch
Audi R8 LMS Evo 1'31.314 0.777
18 26 United Kingdom Esmee Hawkey
Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 1'31.408 0.871
19 12 United States Dev Gore
Audi R8 LMS Evo 1'31.786 1.249

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Previous article Mercedes driver Abril disqualified from Monza DTM weekend
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