Kristensen tops first Lausitz practice

Kristensen has not raced in the DTM since 2009 and is only replacing Mike Rockenfeller at the Abt Audi squad this weekend while he recovers from his heavy Le Mans 24 Hours crash last weekend.

None of that slowed down the 43-year-old Dane though as he took his A4 to the top of the timesheets in 1m19.412s with six minutes of the session remaining.

That time was good enough to displace the older-spec Phoenix Audi of Spielberg winner Martin Tomczyk by 0.026s in what was an extremely close 90 minutes.

Timo Scheider made it an all-Audi top three while Christian Vietoris was the best Mercedes driver in his older-spec, Persson-run car in fourth.

Filipe Albuquerque (Rosberg Audi), David Coulthard (Mucke Mercedes), Renger van der Zande (Persson Mercedes) and Oliver Jarvis (Abt Audi) were next up, while Susie Stoddart was an impressive ninth quickest in her Persson Mercedes.

Fresh from extending his Mercedes contract, Gary Paffett was the best of the HWA drivers in 13th, one spot ahead of his championship-leading team-mate Bruno Spengler.

Ralf Schumacher was 17th, but less than 0.9s off the pace set by Kristensen.


Pos  Driver                Car              Time               Laps
 1.  Tom Kristensen        Audi	            1m19.412s            40
 2.  Martin Tomczyk        Audi	            1m19.438s  + 0.026   37
 3.  Timo Scheider         Audi	            1m19.468s  + 0.056   28
 4.  C.Vietoris            Mercedes	    1m19.572s  + 0.160   30
 5.  F.Albuquerque         Audi	            1m19.628s  + 0.216   40
 6.  David Coulthard       Mercedes	    1m19.728s  + 0.316   29
 7.  R.van der Zande       Mercedes	    1m19.730s  + 0.318   37
 8.  Oliver Jarvis         Audi	            1m19.800s  + 0.388   36
 9.  Susie Stoddart        Mercedes	    1m19.839s  + 0.427   32
10.  Miguel Molina         Audi	            1m19.899s  + 0.487   38
11.  Edoardo Mortara       Audi	            1m19.923s  + 0.511   44
12.  Mattias Ekström       Audi	            1m20.056s  + 0.644   26
13.  Gary Paffett          Mercedes	    1m20.117s  + 0.705   35
14.  Bruno Spengler        Mercedes	    1m20.191s  + 0.779   30
15.  Jamie Green           Mercedes	    1m20.206s  + 0.794   44
16.  Maro Engel            Mercedes	    1m20.228s  + 0.816   32
17.  Ralf Schumacher       Mercedes	    1m20.284s  + 0.872   31
18.  Rahel Frey            Audi	            1m21.298s  + 1.886   16