DTM Lausitz: Philipp Eng takes maiden pole position for race two
A day after taking his first DTM podium, Philipp Eng took pole position for the second race of the weekend at the Lausitzring for BMW
Eng - who led yesterday's race and eventually finished third behind winner Edoardo Mortara and Timo Glock - set a blistering lap of 1m38.150s in the first runs.
Unlike yesterday, drivers struggled to improve on their final runs and Eng bailed out of his last attempt when his pole was confirmed.
DTM returnee Pascal Wehrlein took his best qualifying spot so far since coming back from Formula 1 with second for Mercedes, one of the few drivers to improve in the final shootout which began with four minutes left in the session.
Wehrlein - the 2015 series champion - was just 0.026s adrift of Eng, with Gary Paffett in third place.
"It was my mistake really and tomorrow maybe I'll try and be a little bit safer on the first run, so I can attack for the second," said Paffett on Saturday after a poor qualifying netted him 13th.
The tactic worked and his first run was good enough - despite a wild sideways moment at Turn 7 - to put him third ahead of BMW's 2014 and 2016 champion Marco Wittmann.
Mike Rockenfeller looked set to challenge for pole on his second run thanks to a best overall first sector and a strong middle, but the last sector let him down and he had to settle for fifth, albeit outperforming the next best Audi by eight positions.
Race one winner Mortara will start one spot higher than he did yesterday in sixth, while impressive BMW rookie Joel Eriksson heads Saturday's polesitter Lucas Auer on the fourth row.
Daniel Juncadella finally made a breakthrough in qualifying having struggled to switch his tyres on so far this season, and took ninth for Mercedes ahead of Saturday's second-place man Timo Glock.
Ex-Force India and Williams Formula 1 driver Paul di Resta was the biggest shock of the session, only managing 15th out of 17 cars. He'd finished Saturday's race in sixth.
Race two grid
Pos | Driver | Team | Car | Time | Gap | Laps |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Philipp Eng | RMR | BMW | 1m38.150s | - | 8 |
2 | Pascal Wehrlein | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.176s | 0.026s | 9 |
3 | Gary Paffett | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.218s | 0.068s | 8 |
4 | Marco Wittmann | RMG | BMW | 1m38.283s | 0.133s | 10 |
5 | Mike Rockenfeller | Phoenix | Audi | 1m38.376s | 0.226s | 9 |
6 | Edoardo Mortara | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.538s | 0.388s | 8 |
7 | Joel Eriksson | RBM | BMW | 1m38.556s | 0.406s | 9 |
8 | Lucas Auer | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.566s | 0.416s | 10 |
9 | Daniel Juncadella | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.658s | 0.508s | 9 |
10 | Timo Glock | RMR | BMW | 1m38.673s | 0.523s | 9 |
11 | Bruno Spengler | RBM | BMW | 1m38.675s | 0.525s | 8 |
12 | Augusto Farfus | RMG | BMW | 1m38.710s | 0.560s | 8 |
13 | Nico Muller | Abt | Audi | 1m38.743s | 0.593s | 10 |
14 | Robin Frijns | Abt | Audi | 1m38.756s | 0.606s | 10 |
15 | Paul Di Resta | HWA | Mercedes | 1m38.853s | 0.703s | 9 |
16 | Jamie Green | Rosberg | Audi | 1m38.874s | 0.724s | 10 |
17 | Loic Duval | Phoenix | Audi | 1m38.884s | 0.734s | 9 |
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