Portimao DTM: Bortolotti puts Lamborghini on pole for opener

Grasser Racing’s Bortolotti didn’t venture out on track until the final five minutes of the 20-minute session, opting to complete just a single run in the pole shootout.

However, the lack of track time didn’t appear to have any impact on his driving as he was immediately up to pace, setting the second-quickest lap time of the session behind Red Bull’s Felipe Fraga on his very first flying lap in qualifying.

DTM rookie Mikael Grenier then found over three tenths of a second to dislodge Bortolotti from the top and claim provisional pole for the expanded two-car GruppeM Mercedes team.

However, the Italian had even more pace up his sleeve and responded with a time of 1m39.678s on his final lap, clinching pole position by just 0.011s in his first qualifying session as a DTM full-timer.

The result also marked Lamborghini’s first-ever pole position in the DTM and follows Bortolotti securing a maiden podium for the Italian supercar maker as a wildcard entrant at Assen last year.

Grenier ended up second on the grid alongside Bortolotti, beating the Winward Mercedes of Lucas Auer by just 0.031s as 26 out of 29 drivers were covered by just over a second.

Fraga’s previous time of 1m39.738s put him fourth on the grid in the Red Bull-backed AF Corse Ferrari, just ahead of the Lamborghini of T3 Motorsport’s star signing Nicki Thiim.

Greiner’s teammate Maro Engel qualified sixth on his return to the DTM, setting a time of 1m39.933s in his GruppeM Mercedes.

Schubert Motorsport driver Sheldon van der Linde was the top qualifier for BMW in seventh, just ahead of the HRT Mercedes of Luca Stolz and reigning DTM champion Maximilian Gotz (Winward Mercedes).

Team Rosberg driver Nico Muller led qualifying after first runs but slumped to 10th at the finish, although he remained Audi’s best-placed driver with a time of 1m40.098s.

Qualifying just behind Muller was his former DTM rival and three-time champion Rene Rast, who led the charge for the three-car Abt Sportsline team in 11th.

Rast’s teammates Ricardo Feller and Kelvin van der Linde ended up 13th and 17th respectively, the duo separated by just 0.060s.

Porsche endured a difficult first qualifying session in the DTM despite being competitive in practice, with SSR Performance driver Dennis Olsen the marque’s top qualifier in 19th ahead of Team Bernhard 75’s Thomas Preining.

Factory Porsche driver Laurens Vanthoor fared even worse in the other SSR Performance 911 GT3-R, qualifying more than a second off the pace in 26th place.

Meanwhile, WRC legend Sebastien Loeb qualified in a respectable 21st place during his first weekend in the DTM with the Red Bull AF Corse team, posting a time that was 0.786s slower than pacesetter Bortolotti.

Portimao DTM - Saturday qualifying results:

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Time	Gap
1	63	Mirko Bortolotti	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'39.678
2	55	Mikael Grenier	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'39.689	0.011
3	22	Lucas Auer	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'39.719	0.041
4	74	Felipe Fraga	Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo 2020	1'39.738	0.060
5	95	Nicki Thiim	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'39.929	0.251
6	88	Maro Engel	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'39.933	0.255
7	31	Sheldon Van Der Linde	BMW M4 GT3	1'39.955	0.277
8	4	Luca Stolz	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'39.988	0.310
9	1	Maximilian Götz	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'40.090	0.412
10	51	Nico Müller	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.098	0.420
11	33	René Rast	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.172	0.494
12	18	Maximilian Buhk	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'40.234	0.556
13	7	Ricardo Feller	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.277	0.599
14	85	Clemens Schmid	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'40.281	0.603
15	36	Arjun Maini	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'40.284	0.606
16	11	Marco Wittmann	BMW M4 GT3	1'40.312	0.634
17	3	Kelvin van der Linde	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.337	0.659
18	27	David Schumacher	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'40.360	0.682
19	94	Dennis Olsen	Porsche 911 GT3 R	1'40.388	0.710
20	24	Thomas Preining	Porsche 911 GT3 R	1'40.392	0.714
21	37	Sébastien Loeb	Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo 2020	1'40.464	0.786
22	66	Marius Zug	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.521	0.843
23	12	Dev Gore	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'40.536	0.858
24	25	Philipp Eng	BMW M4 GT3	1'40.623	0.945
25	19	Rolf Ineichen	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'40.697	1.019
26	92	Laurens Vanthoor	Porsche 911 GT3 R	1'40.770	1.092
27	26	Esmee Hawkey	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'40.895	1.217
28	10	Esteban Muth	BMW M4 GT3	1'41.030	1.352
29	6	Alessio Deledda	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo	1'41.880	2.202
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