30th October, 2010
Paffett spices up the battle for the title - pole at Adria
DTM
Adria. The battle for the DTM title is in its hot stage. In the penultimate qualifying session of the season at the Adria International Raceway near Venice, British Mercedes-Benz driver Gary Paffett had the best nerves. The 29-year old completed the lap at the 2.702 kilometres long track in 1:10.471 minutes and will thus be starting from pole position for the final DTM round of the season in Europe on Sunday at 14.00 h. “I had a good feeling throughout the qualifying session. In the battle for the DTM title, I am only third. Of course, I will try to win the final two races, but my position depends on the results by Bruno Spengler and Paul Di Resta”, the 2005 DTM champion said about the eighth pole position of his DTM career.
Canadian driver Spengler will also be starting from the front row of the grid, having qualified second for the tenth season round of 59 laps. The Mercedes-Benz missed out on pole position by only one hundredth of a second. The runner-up in the points’ standings was still very happy, also because his main rival in the battle for the title, Scot Paul Di Resta (Mercedes-Benz) will be starting behind him from sixth place. In the drivers’ standings, Di Resta is leading with 63 points from Spengler and Paffett with 60 and 49 points respectively.
Swede Mattias Ekström was third fastest in qualifying. In qualifying, the Audi driver benefited from a mistake by his team-mate Timo Scheider. In the first heat of the four-stage qualifying, the German crossed the finish line 0.168 seconds too late. His lap time was declared void and Scheider ended up 15th in qualifying. As a result, Ekström still moved up into the decisive 14th place to make it into the next qualifying heat. “Surely, there was a mistake in communication for Timo. I know what it is to have to start from 15th place. In that case, Sunday isn’t much fun. I am happy with third place on the grid and now I will try to move up two positions during the race”, said Ekström.
In fourth place, Mercedes-Benz driver Jamie Green was the best-placed driver of a 2008-spec car. Mike Rockenfeller qualified fifth with his 2008-spec Audi A4 DTM.
The tenth DTM round of the season starts tomorrow at 14.00 h, ARD is broadcasting live from 13.45 h.
