Coulthard hopeful of new DTM deal

The 13-time grand prix winner made a late decision to join the series for 2010 after a handful of tests in the early part of the year.

But he says he is happy with the way he progressed over the campaign, which culminated in the Scot scoring his first DTM point in last weekend's Shanghai finale.

AUTOSPORT revealed in August that Coulthard was keen to commit to the DTM for a second season, and he is now optimistic that a deal can be agreed in the near future.

"The important thing for me - and I keep saying this - is that there's been plenty of potential as the year has gone on," Coulthard told AUTOSPORT.

"If I think back to the first race at Hockenheim, at that point I was thinking 'what am I doing here?' It moved on very quickly from a bit of testing for fun to me ending up on the grid for the first race!

"But I've felt more at home as the season has gone on. I think we've built a good platform for the future, so it's worth sticking around again for a second year.

"Hopefully when we're all back home [from Shanghai] we can get things sorted in the next couple of weeks."

The 39-year-old also reiterated his claim that he would not push to get promoted to a top-spec car ahead of one of the younger drivers at Mercedes.

"I've always made it very clear that I've had my career in Formula 1, and this is just something else for me to enjoy," he added.

"I'm not going to sit here and demand a new car just because of my past achievements. Obviously I take this seriously and I'd love to be in a winning car, but there are drivers out there at the moment that would me far more deserving of it than me."