[ad_1]
(Motorsport-Total.com) – Tough conditions in Saturday’s qualifying at Zolder – and Rosberg Audi driver Rene Rast secured pole position with 1: 28.987 on a wet track, while DTM leader Nico Müller did not go past the seventh on the grid (click here to see the result)!
© ITR
Unusual picture: BMW driver Timo Glock in the top 3, but not Nico Müller Focus
The third in the championship, Rast, who reduced his deficit by three points to 44 points, managed with perfect timing on the final lap to reduce the time of BMW driver Timo Glock by 0.346 seconds and snatch pole position. It is the 20th consecutive pole in the DTM for the Ingolstadt team.
He had to cancel his penultimate lap because of Sheldon van der Linde. Did the BMW driver stop you? “No,” Rast replies to ‘ran.de’. “I came out of the pits and bought new tires, and he was already on a fast lap. I let him pass and then it became clear that he was ahead of me. I was a little faster then, but he did too.” try to do your ranking like everyone else. I don’t expect him to let me pass. “
Rast does not rule out Müller in the race
That was also why Rast left enough distance: “I still had a lap and that was exactly what I wanted.” This was also due to the drying conditions, as Rast makes clear: “I think we did very well today, we went around again shortly before the checkered flag fell and we were able to do another lap. We had the best conditions. “.
Is it the race to catch up on the championship now? “We’ve been trying for several races,” Rast says with a shrug. “Today it was due to the conditions that Nico was not good at the front. But yesterday in the dry you saw that he is strong in the long run. He will also play at the front in the race. But of course we need qualifying sessions like today, where one There is a bit of chaos. That helped us today. “
Frijns is convicted of a green slip
Third place went to Müller’s teammate Robin Frijns, who was 0.497 seconds from Rast’s pole lap. The Dutchman, who was the only one in the top 3 in all qualifiers this season, struggled a bit over time, unlike Rast as he lost time in the first corner due to a slip from Rosberg Audi driver Jamie Green .
“It’s a shame there are yellow flags at Turn 1 of my fastest lap,” the championship runner-up told ‘ran.de’. “So I had to brake. That ruined my lap time.”
But he can live with the result: “With third place you are in front, and overtaking is difficult at Zolder. Now the goal is to get off to a good start and fight with Rene.”
More than a second behind Müller
Since receiving a point for third on the grid, Frijns has cut Müller’s deficit in the championship to 17 points. But you don’t want to overestimate that. “There are still six races left and things can happen quickly: for example if I have a problem with the car, or with Nico or Rene. So we have to stay focused.”
Qualifying didn’t go as planned for DTM leader Müller. The Swiss, who is now 17 points ahead of Frijns in the championship, even fell into the gravel trap and finished at 1,052 seconds in seventh place. Since you can barely overtake in Zolder, this is not a good starting point for the Abt-Audi driver.
The joy in the BMW camp is even greater, even though it was difficult to keep up in the early stages of qualifying: Glock put the M4 in the front row for the first time this season, and also gave the Munich team the first qualifying points of the season. However, the former Formula 1 driver even mourns the Pole.
Why Glock regrets pole position
“I had a bit of bad luck with Jamie Green, who hit the gravel in front of me at Turn 1,” he reveals to ‘ran.de’ that things were similar to Frijns. “So I had to take half a second off, just to avoid making my personal best in the first sector. In the second sector I was doing very well and then I made a mistake in the last corner. But overall we have to be happy.”
Glock is in a good mood for the race: “We have nothing to lose. We may even be on the better side here as it dries faster than the left side. We see what we can do. The car was good yesterday so so much full attack. “
With Marco Wittmann (+0.517) in fourth position and van der Linde (+0.972) in sixth position, there are two other BMW drivers in promising positions.
Audi’s WRT driver Harrison Newey gave a test of talent in his Belgian team’s home race: the rookie put his RS 5 1,056 seconds behind in a solid eighth place and thus was also faster. than the official drivers of Audi Loic Duval (tenth) and Green. (13.). ART-BMW driver Robert Kubica fell short of 15th, 2,429 seconds behind.
