Timo Scheider: From journeyman to champion in 12 months

Nobody had mentioned it all season, but as Timo Scheider sat down after the season finale at Hockenheim as the new DTM champion, someone finally said what the whole paddock had been thinking all year: "To be honest, at the start of the year I don't think anyone was expecting the Audi challenge to come from Timo."

Those were the words of Jamie Green shortly after the race. It was said with total respect for the new champion, but few could disagree with Jamie. In fact, Scheider himself admits that he wouldn't have put money on his black Audi for the title, even after a pre-season in which he had topped most of the tests.

"Expectations were high for 2008, but nothing like this," he beamed, having had a bit of time to reflect on what he has achieved this year. "Basically, the new car worked in the right way for me and we found a good set-up straight away. But it was only testing. Only after the first race did I realise that this was a car I could be quite successful with."

'Quite successful' is a pretty big understatement. Scheider was the class of the field on that April weekend in Hockenheim, topping every session. So the fact that Mattias Ekstrom got the jump on him at the start and held on to snatch a first win from his German teammate seemed a bit of an injustice. Not that Scheider saw it that way.

"Of course it was disappointing, but for me it was another podium, after only getting my first one in the last race of 2007. That year had started so badly with a crash with Bruno Spengler on the last lap, so this time I was happy because I was fighting on the same level as Mattias. So it was good."

Timo Scheider celebrates his first podium in the 2007 DTM finale at Hockenheim © XPB

It's proof that despite only getting second place after a dominant weekend, Scheider was just pleased to have put in that sort of performance. As someone not used to fighting at the very front in the DTM, he wasn't as hard on himself as those accustomed to winning would have been.

But as the season continued, Scheider quickly developed into a true title contender. He led the standings from the second race onwards and withstood plenty of pressure through the year as Mercedes, and in particular Paul di Resta, hunted him down. But he didn't crack, again much to the surprise of most people in the paddock.

"After the past few years, I'm sure there were people who thought I wasn't too bad, but not a front-runner, not a champion," says Scheider, who has eight seasons of DTM competition under his belt. "So the biggest thing for me was to show my level and show these people I was a guy who could win races. In the end, there was also the championship."

Despite leading the standings for so long, Scheider wouldn't be drawn on talking about the title. Even as he headed into the final three races with a nine-point lead, he refused to think about it. For him, this magical season was purely about trying to win races, and prove his doubters wrong.

"Leading the championship was nice, but I always felt I was too far away to think about it," he says. "I'm just really happy that I could show what I was capable of. After the finale at Hockenheim I had a lot of people coming up to me, saying sorry for what they thought in the past. They were all saying how I impressed them this year, which was nice."

There's no doubting that Scheider owes his title in part to the brand new A4 that Audi rolled out for this season. The car was utterly dominant in the first few races, with the lead Mercedes drivers having to fight as hard as they could just to sneak onto the podium.

With the car suiting his smooth technique more than the aggressive, oversteering style of someone like Ekstrom, Scheider initially took advantage of this to start the season with a second place and that emotional first career victory at Oschersleben. But he followed this up with a jump-start from pole at Mugello and, when he looks back now, he feels that the first half of the season was a missed opportunity for Audi in general.

"We had a better car at the beginning," he says. "But maybe we didn't squeeze enough points out of those first four races, because we had a definite advantage. We knew that Mercedes would catch up, and they made some huge steps, so by the end the cars were about the same. We'd lost our advantage and that was tough."

Timo Scheider in the OPC Team Holzer Opel at the 2004 Zandvoort round © XPB

But having just turned 30 this week, Scheider is a man with plenty of experience of tough times. From 2000-2004 he spent his formative years in the DTM struggling with Opel, before getting the chop at the end of '04 despite being the manufacturer's top driver. That left him without a seat for 2005 and, despite his best efforts, he had to head off to FIA GTs for a year, almost winning the title. But his heart was in the DTM, and he felt he'd not been able to do himself justice during his first stint in the series.

"When Opel cut my contract, I tried all the time to speak to [Audi Sport boss] Dr Wolfgang Ullrich to get a drive with Audi," he says. "But it wasn't possible for '05, and it felt like it was nearly the end of my career. It was a hard time, I had a son and a family by then, so things were tough. I tried again for 2006 to speak to Dr Ullrich, because I felt that one day I had to go back and show what I could really do. I also had some discussions with [Mercedes motorsport boss] Norbert Haug. He was telling me that I had to come back to DTM, but I wanted to drive for Audi. Then I had a phone call from Dr Ullrich, and he said 'okay'. It was a big moment - I'm glad I made all those phone calls."

Audi proved its loyalty to Scheider by rewarding him with a promotion to a new car in 2007 after a solid first year in an older car. He started the year slowly, but there were performances at the end of the season that suggested he had what was needed to be a front-runner.

He played the team game in the latter stages of the year, sacrificing a maiden podium at Zandvoort, for example, which masked his upturn in performances. But just 12 months on from that elusive podium finish, he was celebrating another career first - a thoroughly deserved DTM crown.