Ex-Ellen Lohr Mercedes wins as classic DTM cars return to Norisring
Classic DTM cars returned to the Norisring last weekend as part of the contemporary series' support bill at the Nuremberg street circuit
The Tourenwagen Classics series features mainly DTM machinery from the mid-1980s up to '96, by which time it had evolved into the high-tech and high-budget, short-lived ITC.
Stefan Rupp took pole position in an ex-Fisichella Alfa Romeo 155 V6 TI and led for most of the race before the car ground to a halt with a couple of laps remaining, with smoke billowing from the Alfa's overheating engine.
But Rupp would not have won anyway, having been black-flagged for ignoring a drive-through penalty that was issued after he broke the pitlane speed limit during his mandatory stop.
By the time of Rupp's retirement, the only other machine from the very latest days of the ultimate Class 1 V6 touring cars had also been sidelined.
Jorg Hatscher, driving the Mercedes C-Class crashed at the Norisring by Jan Magnussen in 1996, smacked the wall exiting the chicane with seven laps to go, with suspension damage putting him out of the race.
That left victory to Thorsten Stadler in his ex-Ellen Lohr 1994 Mercedes C-Class, while former BMW works driver Altfrid Heger took a 1991-spec ex-Bigazzi BMW M3 to second place.
Richard Weber, driving an ex-MM Diebels team M3, couldn't fend off Heger, but took third ahead of former DTM champion and Opel sports chief Volker Strycek, who was driving the 1991 Opel Omega test car.
Another ex-DTM racer, former BMW junior team driver Marc Hessel, shared an M3 to fifth place with Stephan Piepenbrink.
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