Does 2000 hold the answers to DTM's current crisis?

"As I see it, the DTM's future now hangs by a thread".

That's a widely-held sentiment in recent times as Audi's impending exit at the end of 2020 leaves the DTM teetering on the precipice, with BMW its only remaining manufacturer. It points to an alarming trend, the series having also lost Mercedes at the end of 2018 and ambitious Aston Martin privateer R-Motorsport in January this year.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic, the DTM was set for an entry of just 16 cars this year, despite ART returning to run a customer BMW for Robert Kubica and Audi squad WRT expanding to field three cars. That would have been its lowest grid since the modern DTM's return in 2000, 20 years ago this week, with 19 cars.

Cost-cutting was already a pressing issue for Audi before it announced its departure, and HWA boss Ulrich Fritz admitted that the current 'Class One' formula was too expensive for privateers following the departure of his company's former technical partner R-Motorsport, which is understood to have forked out €20 million last year for a best finish of sixth.

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But, in fact, the pessimistic words quoted at the start of this article were written in Autosport magazine in 2007 after a dramatic weekend at Barcelona.

In response to its two title contenders Martin Tomczyk and Mattias Ekstrom being eliminated in accidents with Mercedes drivers, Audi had ordered that its seven cars that were still running should retire with 10 laps to go, casting serious doubt on its continuation in the series beyond the year.

Although it survived those tense months, and even thrived when BMW joined in 2012, the DTM has struggled to sustain the level of optimism that surrounded it in 2000, when Mercedes, Opel and a small contingent of privately entered Audis - the squat TTs propping up the grid in not-too-dissimilar fashion to the R-Motorsport Astons last year - emerged from the ashes of the old International Touring Car Championship and performed for packed grandstands of 56,000 at Hockenheim.

For all the public enthusiasm that has surrounded the Class One project ever since ITR chairman Gerhard Berger and Super GT's Masaaki Bandoh agreed on a regulations tie-up in 2018, the DTM has been caught in something of an identity crisis in recent years.

There was purpose and clarity in 2000 that the 2020-spec DTM just can't buy

Berger's scepticism of electric racing seemingly ruled out a hybrid future, even as the DTM moved away from the normally aspirated four-litre V8s it had used since 2000 towards four-cylinder two-litre turbos to appease the manufacturers' desire for green credentials. But that position was altered last year, as Berger explained in December that a single-spec hybrid from 2022 would be the likely path.

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The new-for-2019 engines were billed as the first step in a long-planned move towards a set of common regulations with Super GT that would eventually lead to DTM cars racing in Japan, and Super GT manufacturers Nissan, Honda and Toyota coming to Germany.

After a toe-in-the water outing for three of the Japanese cars at the Hockenheim season finale, a highly anticipated exhibition event staged at Fuji last November proved a qualified success, despite Aston Martin's absence.

Several key points over how convergence would ultimately be achieved remained unsolved prior to Audi's bombshell, not least the continued aerodynamic and tyre development of the Japanese cars, whereas the DTM cars use many spec components including Hewland transmissions, AP Racing brakes and Hankook tyres.

There's also Super GT's continued resistance to DTM's push for hybrid, while DTM 'gimmicks' such as push-to-pass and DRS are anathema to the Japanese. Working out a BoP to equalise what are in essence a sprint series and an endurance series would be no easy task.

But a matter of months after the Fuji 'Dream Race', hopes for a return to full-fat Class One akin to the ITC's short-lived mid-1990s heyday now appear fanciful, and the DTM is facing up to the possibility that it may be forced into abandoning its current roadmap altogether.

While BMW Motorsport boss Jens Marquardt had said that one season with only two manufacturers would not be "a big problem", and had demonstrated his commitment to the series by dropping BMW's factory World Endurance Championship programme, Audi's withdrawal changes the picture entirely.

There was none of that uncertainty in 2000. On the contrary, there was purpose and clarity that the 2020-spec DTM just can't buy.

Wary of the excesses that had in 1996 brought about the collapse of the ITC, when Alfa Romeo and Opel both pulled out citing poor return on high costs - sound familiar? - the 2000 regulations were designed to provide much more bang for the manufacturers' buck.

Where the ITC boasted four-wheel drive, complex electronics and trick suspension, the new-for-2000 cars had swapped 2.5-litre V6 engines for four-litre V8 powerplants limited to 450bhp that would last all season, common Xtrac transmissions and spec Dunlop tyres. Complex electronics were banned, and a minimum weight of 1050kg imposed to discourage the use of lightweight materials.

"They were trying to control the costs because the ITC just exploded when too much money was getting fired into it and the car manufacturers couldn't keep up, so they came in with their eyes open, saying, 'We've got a new car, it's a lot more simple'," recalls Peter Dumbreck, who raced a Persson Motorsport Mercedes CLK to two fifth places during the opening weekend.

"We had no traction control. We'd already had paddles in the [Mercedes CLR] Le Mans car from the year before but they decided to go with a sequential gearbox, so all the cars had the same running gear and transmission. It was down to the engine and car and set-up."

Not only were they cheaper than the ITC cars, but they were also more cost-effective than two-litre Super Tourers. Opel technical director Donatus Wichelhaus revealed that eight DTM cars could be run for the cost of five Super Tourers, and there were some arguing that the BTCC - then down to three manufacturers following the pull-outs of Volvo, Renault and Nissan - should follow a similar course for 2001. Leading BTCC independent Team Dynamics, then running a year-old Nissan, even visited the DTM paddock on a fact-finding mission.

But those concerned that the new DTM cars wouldn't be a match for what had gone before needn't have worried. Pedro Lamy, one of five ex-F1 drivers on the grid in 2000, told Autosport in the pre-season that the DTM Mercedes was "very easy to drive, but it is difficult to find the limit".

"These cars were not so well-advanced, especially with ABS which we ran in '96, with traction controls, all these kinds of electronic gimmicks. At the end of the day it was more up to the driver" Manuel Reuter

Dumbreck agreed, saying back then that "if you get a slide on, it doesn't come back, you just continue sliding through the corner. It's enjoyable, but a difficult challenge to make it lap quickly."

Manuel Reuter, the 1996 ITC champion for Opel, won four times in 2000 to finish runner-up behind Bernd Schneider, and agrees that the drivers were making more of a difference than before.

"It was basically more down to pure driving, to talent," recalls Reuter.

"These cars were not so well-advanced, especially with ABS which we ran in '96, with traction controls, all these kinds of electronic gimmicks. They were forbidden because the championship in the '90s was so horrendously expensive in the end, so we had to reduce it in a lot of areas and at the end of the day it was more up to the driver."

Inevitably this was helped by the fact that everybody was starting from scratch, and updates would reach different teams at different times according to the pecking order.

But the attraction was such that Klaus Ludwig (pictured below en-route to victory at the Sachsenring) was compelled to make a comeback for Mercedes at the age of 50, having retired at the end of his title-winning 1998 FIA GT campaign - despite aching hips that prompted him into a switch to left-foot braking. His insights into how the cars differed makes for fascinating reading, 20 years later.

"The Coupe is amazing," Ludwig told Autosport in 2000. "It doesn't have much to do with the old Class 1 touring cars we had back in '95-96. In many ways, it is nearer to the type of machine I raced for Mercedes in FIA GT. There's a lot less downforce, of course, but the car is really stiff and incredibly well-balanced.

"The CLK's V8 is slightly less powerful than an ITC-spec V6, but its power is far more usable. You don't drive with top-end power, you drive with the torque of the engine. Combine the driveability of the powerplant with the mechanical grip of the chassis and we are already quicker around Vallelunga than we were in the Class 1 days."

It's interesting food for thought. Could taking a retrograde step and adopting simpler cars be the reset the DTM needs?

"This is a definite feeling I have and it's not just me - this is the talks we've had in the paddock with drivers down the years," says Audi's two-time DTM champion Timo Scheider, who as an Opel youngster was one of the star rookies of the 2000 season.

"We always compared the Australian V8 Supercar series with the dream category of how DTM could and should be probably: less downforce, less carbon parts, smaller tyres and more power to go fourth gear around a corner sideways more or less, to have close racing to bumpdraft without destroying some flicks and flaps on your car.

"That was always in discussion from the drivers' side, but there is always the will and the intention of the manufacturers to develop something to show what special potential it has."

Scheider finally retired from the DTM at the end of the 2016 season, but keeps a close eye on the series today and believes that it has some key faults.

"I did like to drive cars with a lot of downforce - on a single lap in qualifying this was pure fun," he continues. "But in terms of racing, when you realise you just can follow for a couple of laps until you start destroying the front tyres and suddenly you can't fight anymore, then it feels bad!

"This 'fake' overtaking with DRS and push-to-pass is a good thing for the fan if they see some more overtaking, but I would prefer if there would be the choice to have none of those options and [instead have] less downforce and cheaper cars to race harder than is now possible.

"Even in my time, it was always about trying to avoid the traffic, trying to avoid people, trying to avoid racing - and that was somehow weird to understand that you go into a race but you're trying not to race anyone, just to be as quick as possible.

"I'm proud to have such a long history in DTM, but I can also say we have had some very tough times and I had also moments where I thought, 'What the hell am I doing here?'"

"For the fan, it's not relevant that we run sophisticated four-cylinder turbo engines, they would like to see good, tough racing, no team orders" Manuel Reuter

Of course, where manufacturers are involved, the process won't be straightforward. Dumbreck concedes that "the writing is on the wall for DTM as we know it", but reasons that it might not be as simple as returning to 2000-inspired back-to-basics rules.

"I think there is possibly going to be a revolt about everything going electric, but it would be a very brave manufacturer or group of manufacturers to say, 'No, we're going back to a four-litre engine and make it nice and simple so it runs forever' like the Americans have with NASCAR," he says.

Reuter maintains that the base concept for 2000 "was and is right" and believes the DTM has made "exactly the same mistakes" as the ITC in moving away from the DNA of rough-and-ready tin-tops towards high-bred engineering projects. He reckons a major rethink will be required.

"I think the problem is the championship got too expensive, we found not enough manufacturers in Germany or in Europe to jump into the series and over the years also it was going far too engineer-driven, not as the basic concept in 2000," Reuter says.

"I was involved from 2014-15 in the DTM sporting working group and you could clearly see that the manufacturers' engineers say which route we have to go and this, at the end of the day, was basically the death of the championship.

"With the implementation of this four-cylinder turbo engine last year, we can speculate how many millions this cost, but is the sport getting better with this kind of engines? No. The money that you have to spend to be successful is by far too much.

"At the end of the day we have to ask ourselves, 'For what are we doing this championship?', and the first priority should be our fans. For the fan, it's not relevant that we run sophisticated four-cylinder turbo engines, they would like to see good, tough racing, no team orders. We lost our DNA that was built in the '90s or in the beginning of the 2000s with the new DTM. Close fights with team-mates, no team orders, go for it, good show and the crowd goes crazy.

"We can dream like DTM says, 'still the platform is really great and we have in five years hybrid' or whichever kind of cars, but we have to go more towards good entertainment. For what reason do we need high sophisticated aero? We might be five or 10 seconds quicker, it's nice for you if you do a quali lap, but this is not our sport.

"Our sport is fighting door to door, bumper to bumper. This is our sport and getting past two or three times per lap, this should be the aim to develop a championship and not say 'this is a fantastic piece of engineering'.

"A lot of horsepower, low aero, and for me a lot of mechanical sensors have to be out of the car. At the end of the day the driver should give you the feedback of how the car behaves and in which direction we should develop it."

Reuter puts forward a GT3 budget as a "realistic" option for the DTM in a post-coronavirus landscape. The laptime difference (on fastest race laps) last year between the GT3-based ADAC GT Masters series and DTM was 7.3s at the Nurburgring and 9.5s at Hockenheim. But with a ready supply of manufacturers building cars, it could be a viable option to keep the DTM afloat.

"We have to use this crisis to make the right conclusions," continues Reuter. "We have to be really clever for the future and use this crisis as a last signal to say 'stop'. We have to do a proper rethink of what we can do, which series are attractive and how we can start in the new future after corona."

This weekend the DTM should be preparing for the third round of the 2020 championship at the new Igora Drive circuit in Russia, one of three new venues on the original calendar - along with Monza and Anderstorp - as part of Berger's push for internationalisation.

The series' first visit to Russia since its five-year spell at Moscow Raceway from 2013-17 would have gone some way to addressing criticism from 2016 runner-up Edoardo Mortara that it "didn't really evolve so much", but an even bolder move still would be to take inspiration from the clean break of the past and get the fans bouncing again.