The season that revitalised a sleeping giant

"The star of something big" - evidently a reference to Mercedes' three-pointed star for those car badge buffs out there - was the headline on Autosport's report as the DTM roared back into life at Hockenheim 20 years ago today.

Mercedes driver Bernd Schneider dominated both races from pole, but to dwell on that fact would be to miss the point on a truly significant weekend for motorsport in Germany as the three-year wait for a return of big banger tin-tops - following the demise of the International Touring Car Championship in 1996 - was finally ended. The raucous response of the 56,000-strong crowd told its own story.

"Driving here, you think 'it was only days ago we were racing with the original DTM'," said Schneider. "The atmosphere is just as good as it used to be."

His boss Norbert Haug, the Mercedes head of motorsport who had been so pivotal in getting the series off the ground, remarked that the DTM's first weekend back was "like a dream come true".

"This weekend has shown that the rules are right," he said.

Of course, given the dominance of his main man, Haug was hardly about to slate the new era for the series. But the comments of his opposite number Volker Strycek, head of motorsport at Opel, were perhaps even more telling.

"The event lived up to all our expectations," said Strycek, the 1984 DTM champion. "It is a clear indication of a great future.

"I am relieved, happy and proud. After all, nobody knew if everything would work."

In replacing the old high-tech ITC monsters with altogether more simple machines that were crude in appearance but no less spectacular to watch, the DTM had created a winning spectacle - and the product on track was far better than Schneider's dominance made out.

Mercedes had beaten Opel to the punch to start testing, so there was a degree of confidence that one of its eight cars would be able to see off the eight-strong Opel contingent at Hockenheim. Zakspeed tested its Volvo C70 Coupe with Jorg van Ommen but opted not to compete, while Audi beat the odds to make it to the grid, although its prospects were only marginally more promising.

As a non-factory effort run by Abt that was completed in just 100 days, the trio of stubby TT-Rs were expected to fill out the 19-car grid, and so it proved with reigning German Super Touring champion Christian Abt 17th ahead of reigning British Touring Car champion Laurent Aiello and Kris Nissen.

"The Opel was delivering because of the engine power and not because of the mechanical grip" Timo Scheider

Aiello's fifth place in the September meeting at Oschersleben, which came after half the field had been wiped out in a first corner pile-up instigated by Joachim Winkelhock, was the high point of a dismal season, although a rule break transformed Audi into a competitive force that won the title with Aiello in 2002 before becoming a fully-fledged manufacturer entry in 2004.

As the season proper got underway, it became clear that the longer wheel-base Mercedes CLK had the edge on handling, but Opel's Astra Coupe was narrowly better on top speed - presenting a fascinating match-up for the season ahead.

"The expectations were quite high because we were quite confident that our package was not too bad, which proved in the first two races at Hockenheim where we were on the pace with the Mercs," recalls Opel talisman Manuel Reuter, who had won the 1996 ITC title in the fearsome Opel Calibra V6.

"Chassis-wise, they were clearly better, they had the upper-hand but also it was the first time we had the air-restrictor. Spiess was our partner in developing the engine and they had a lot of experience tuning engines with an air restrictor from Formula 3, so in the first half of the season we were a little bit up on power."

Future double DTM champion Timo Scheider, then a German F3 graduate making his series debut for Opel, has a similar recollection about his Team Holzer machine.

"The engine was quite powerful," says Scheider, the youngest driver on the grid that year at 21, "but then I realised, we have no aero! That's why we were quick in a straight-line and we were struggling a lot in the medium to high-speed corners.

"As soon as you were in a mid-to-high speed corner it became quite tricky. You had to have a special driving style to adapt to somehow get around the corner. For sure the Opel was delivering because of the engine power and not because of the mechanical grip."

The two marques each won eight of the 16 races, but it was Schneider (below at Hockenheim) who had the lion's share of Mercedes' success with six wins to Reuter's four. He also scored more podium finishes - 12 to Reuter's nine - and duly romped to the title, although a nightmare final round for Reuter on the old Hockenheim GP circuit exacerbated the gap.

"In the end we lost the championship at the Sachsenring where I had a tyre failure [while running third]," says Reuter. "Since that time then we were running behind.

"Also the last race in Hockenheim where [Team Phoenix] lost the team's championship when Uwe [Alzen] hit me was really unlucky and not cool for me personally!"

History tells us that Opel would never win again after 2000 and pulled out at the end of 2005 when its Vectra GTS failed to redress the balance. But Opel's impact on the 2000 season opener at Hockenheim's short course was significant, as Scheider continued the fine tradition of the ITC giving rise to young talents in the vein of Dario Franchitti, Jan Magnussen, Alex Wurz, Giancarlo Fisichella and Oliver Gavin.

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Scheider had been runner-up to Nick Heidfeld in the 1997 German F3 championship, but had been unable to build on it in the subsequent years and by the end of 1999 was looking like a forgotten man: "I was waiting on different motorshows for hours and hours trying to get an appointment with Volker Strycek to convince him that I could be a good choice," he says.

Scheider was only confirmed for the drive at the start of May and had two days of testing prior to the first round, but caused a stir when he matched team leader Reuter's time in qualifying to line up third on the grid for race one, one place ahead of top Mercedes rookie Marcel Fassler.

"There was not much expectation because it was already a dream coming true when I got the decision from Opel to be part of the team. I was a newbie getting no attention from the big boys because I was just a kid" Timo Scheider

"[Reuter] was the Opel hero and the champion, so for me it was like 'oh my God, what's happening here?'" recalls Scheider. But it got better still in race one.

Reuter got the jump on Schneider at the start, but locked up at Turn 2 and plummeted down to 10th, leaving the rookie to run second for much of the way. He was only overhauled late on by Fassler and the recovering Reuter.

"Due to the fact that I came out of F3 and everyone was like 'you will never handle that, you're going into probably the most competitive touring car championship you can find', I was on the one hand very nervous and on the other side super happy to line up with all those big names," continues Scheider (below centre, with Thomas Jaeger and Fassler).

"There was actually not too much expectation because it was already a dream coming true when I got the decision from Opel to be part of the team. I was a newbie getting no attention from the big boys because I was just a kid."

Scheider admits he didn't eat anything before race one due to nerves and, having not taken on enough fluid in race one, felt dehydrated and "exhausted like hell".

"I was sitting next to my car and had no idea how I can handle the second race," he says. "But I went in and delivered somehow."

He spun at the start and fell to last but, in the wet conditions, steadily climbed through the order to again finish fourth, profiting from Reuter's second contretemps at Turn 2 to end the weekend as the top Opel driver. This time, Reuter had turned around the Persson Mercedes of Peter Dumbreck while battling over third - although he had the excuse that his windscreen wipers weren't working and he could barely see, causing him to spin later around the same lap. He finished 13th after being docked 30 seconds.

Although the natural Opel order would be reasserted at the following round, Oschersleben, where Reuter won both races, Scheider had made his point and went on to secure back-to-back titles in 2008-09.

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For 1998 Macau GP winner and Japanese F3 champion Dumbreck, not having to unlearn the traits needed to be quick in a two-litre Super Tourer - which had filled the void in Germany after the ITC's demise - was a contributing factor in the young drivers making an instant impression against the old guard.

"If you're coming as a young driver out of single-seaters, the car is nothing like a front-wheel-drive Super Touring, it's a different thing altogether," says Dumbreck, who finished fifth in both early season Hockenheim races.

"It's proven itself through the years where you get really good drivers coming from other areas and they don't fully get their heads around it because it's so tricky.

"You had a lot of power and a lack of grip, you had a window of grip on the Dunlop tyres and you had to try to protect them but also get the best out of them. There was a big step down on grip as you did the first two laps and then it was all about hanging on as long as you could."

Another young driver making his start in professional racing that first weekend was Briton Darren Turner (above, left with Dumbreck), who had keenly watched compatriots Franchitti and Gavin's fortunes in the "iconic" previous generation machines. But in contrast to Scheider, Turner's two seasons in the DTM with Team Rosberg would be a fairly forgettable start to a career that to date counts three class victories at Le Mans and five wins in the BTCC, the reality of life in a non-works DTM seat quickly becoming apparent.

Turner and team-mate Pedro Lamy shared a car early in testing - "each team was being given a car as soon as one was built" - but early impressions were very positive. Come the first race however, the 1998 Formula Palmer Audi runner-up qualified mid-grid in 11th and managed a best finish of eighth in the wet race two.

"From early in the championship, being competitive was very difficult," recalls Turner, who since 2005 has been a factory driver for Aston Martin. "Your car has got this performance, that car has got that performance, but you've still got to get the best out of it what you possibly can. Once I got my head around it and understood what the role was and what we were trying to achieve, it became a bit easier to deal with."

"You've got everyone starting on the same footing with a brand-new car because it's a new championship but, as the year went on, the HWA cars were benefitting from a quicker development" Peter Dumbreck

Turner admits to being "blissfully unaware" of the situation and at first thought he simply wasn't trying hard enough, but conversations with Mercedes stablemates revealed that he didn't have parity of equipment.

"It became apparent from conversations, like 'oh, we've got the new dampers this weekend'," he says. "'What do you mean new dampers, we're on the same configuration from the Hockenheim first test!' 'Oh, we're on version three', and then you start to understand where the difference in performance is."

Turner wasn't the only Mercedes affected, with fellow semi-works driver Dumbreck finding the going progressively tougher after Hockenheim. Two second place finishes at the Sachsenring behind veteran Klaus Ludwig in the 'works' HWA Mercedes was the high point and contributed to the Scot being promoted to join Schneider at the top table for 2001 when the recently unretired 'King' Ludwig returned to his pipe and slippers.

"You've got everyone starting on the same footing with a brand-new car because it's a new championship but, as the year went on, the HWA cars were benefitting from a quicker development," says Dumbreck. "Earlier in the season I thought we could maybe not match Schneider in the top car, but at least be up there.

"But as the season went on, you've got Opel making steps forward with their top cars and Mercedes making steps forward and gradually the semi-works cars were dropping back down the grid.

"Still, I had two fifths at Hockenheim and was pretty happy with that. I felt like I drove well that weekend and maybe opened a few people's eyes to what I could do in a DTM car."

Turner ended the year with a season's best sixth-place finish on the full Hockenheim circuit, his campaign summed up by the second visit to Oschersleben when his throttle stuck open in qualifying and dropped him into the pack, whereupon he was caught up in the pile-up that caused enough damage to force him out for the weekend.

"You can shout and shout and then the next thing you'll be shown the door, or you just make the best of what you've got and enjoy the fact that you're part of DTM," he says. "In terms of the racing, I absolutely loved it and if you're fighting for 15th, you're still fighting hard and giving it everything you've got.

"It was frustrating but you're in a manufacturer programme and if there's eight cars, it's really hard for a manufacturer to keep upgrading and developing all eight cars. It becomes obvious that there's going to be a hierarchy at some point and that is how they run the programme. From an individual point of view it's not always ideal but from a manufacturer's point of view it's quite often the best way of doing it and also sometimes the only way of doing it."

Despite his superb start, Scheider too was caught up in intra-Opel politics and wouldn't hit the same heights as his remarkable debut for the rest of the year.

"For sure I had my struggles throughout the season," says Scheider, who had regressed to sixth of the Opel drivers behind Winkelhock, Alzen, Michael Bartels and Eric Helary by season's end. "The first week was almost too good so the expectation raised quite quickly.

"I had to learn that there is a certain line-up and you're probably not getting the first choice if there was any updates coming throughout the season. I had to do my job as good as possible, but I should not ask too much!

"But if you are not going for the victory, at least you are trying to beat your team-mates and that was finally enough in the 2000 season to get a longer contract with a bit more money. This year for sure was a new start into a special career."

Amid the DTM's current predicament following Audi's announcement of its intent to withdraw at the end of the season, it's tempting to look back at the start of 2000 - when all the Mercedes and Opels were at an equal stage in their development - and put it on a pedestal without considering the unique criteria that created it. As Turner points out, retaining the level of parity that levelled the playing field between the new names and the old guard could not be realistically continued.

And while there might be some merit in a return to a more simplistic rules set, the 2000 season still featured the politicking that has come hand-in-hand with the DTM in the years since - witness the way Schneider and Reuter resumed their status from '96 as the favoured drivers for their respective marques.

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"It's really easy to look at the black and white results sheet and say 'that didn't help me', but it gave me the stepping stone to being a professional driver and working with manufacturers" Darren Turner

"In those days it was clear who the team leaders were," says Dumbreck, who lasted one season with HWA before an innocuous comment to the media resulted in his demotion back to Persson for 2002. "That meant that you didn't get close championships, you got runaway winners who had every support necessary."

The DTM isn't perfect, but no series is. Twenty years on from its grand return, the very real prospect of a series that has given so many drivers their first professional opportunities disappearing into oblivion should not be taken lightly. Without it, the 2000 crop and those who followed afterwards - future DTM champions Mattias Ekstrom and Martin Tomczyck arrived in 2001 - might have had very different careers.

While Turner's DTM spell was a long way from his most successful, he speaks for many when he says that the experience was pivotal in his development.

"In terms of putting me on the map as a professional driver, having two years with Mercedes did that," he says. "That experience and understanding of working at that level is always going to be invaluable.

"It's really easy to look at the black and white results sheet and say 'that didn't help me', but it gave me the stepping stone to being a professional driver and working with manufacturers, which all helped me to build enough momentum to get on the map with the sportscars and I've not looked back since 2003."