24 Sep Nico Müller sixth at the Red Bull Ring
The Swiss Nico Müller finished the 13th race of the DTM season on the 4.318 kilometers long Red Bull Ring in sixth place. He was involved in a long battle for positions with Thomas Preining, which also included some contact. As a result, the Austrian received a ten-seconds time penalty during the race, which threw him back behind Müller. Hours after crossing the finish line, this penalty was withdrawn, as was the time penalty imposed on Lucas Auer for speeding in the pit lane. Consequently, the Swiss fell back from fourth to sixth place. His teammate Dev Gore got off to a good start, however, over the course of the race had to let some rivals pass him. Finally, the American saw the finish line in 20th place.
Nico Müller: “My start was kind of strange: I had the feeling that I had reacted well, but somehow still lost places. Even before turn one, I was only fourth. After that, I had an intense battle with Thomas Preining. Most of the time it was a cool one, but three times, he pushed a bit too hard and crashed into my car. I believe race control did the right thing by giving him a time penalty. Maybe ten seconds were too harsh, but I feel like there should have been a position swap with me for sure. I do not think it is right that he is getting away fully unscathed.”
Dev Gore: “My start was decent and the first three laps went well. After that, I was lacking speed, especially with the first set of tyres. Things went better with the second set, but I was no longer able to move forward.”
Kimmo Liimatainen (team principal): “Nico did a good job during qualifying with third place and since René Rast was dropped three places due to a collision two weeks ago, Nico was even allowed to start from the front row. It is hard for us to understand why the penalty against Thomas Preining was withdrawn after the race and Nico ended up sixth. This result is certainly not bad and brings in a few points, but when you start from the front row, you obviously hope for more. Dev started from the back of the grid and it is never easy to move up to the front. We were hoping to get him a little further up the field with a safety car period, but that did not happen.”