The first two race weekends of the 2016 DTM season have left Augusto Farfus motivated ahead of the third that takes place this weekend, and sees the teams head back to Germany and to the east of the country to the Lausitzring. This also comes at the end of a busy time for the Brazilian with two DTM races and a 24 race on the Nürburgring on consecutive weekends.
After solid points finishes in his Shell BMW M4 DTM in Hockenheim and Spielberg, Augusto is currently seventh in the drivers’ standings with 32 points, 11 behind the leader. Now he heads to the track where he was first on a DTM podium in only his second race in the series in 2012, since then it has not been the best circuit for him. However, one of his many good points is that he always looks forwards with a positive frame of mind and this was reflected when he said: “I think in the past the Lausitzring has not been the best race for us, but, as we showed in Spielberg, we are a great team and we can ‘play’ well together. I think the key to this championship is to keep scoring and always be on the hunt, which we have done so far this season. We closed the gap to the leaders in Spielberg, so we are heading forwards on the right path.”
While this weekend will only be races five and six of the 18 round series, the driver from Curitiba has already gelled well with his new team, BMW Team MTEK. “We are working very closely as a team. I am very happy with them and the way they are doing the job. Therefore, this makes me very motivated and I hope maybe in the Lausitzring I will be able to repeat my 2012 result, when I was third and claimed my first DTM podium.”
The track itself is one of the newest on the DTM calendar, with the Moscow Raceway being the only younger one. It was opened in 2000, the first DTM race was held there just two weeks later, and since then the series has raced there every year, making this its 17th visit. The track has several different layouts, but the one the DTM uses is 3.478 kilometres long. The full name of the track is EuroSpeedway Lausitz and it is 130 kilometres south of Berlin and very close to the border with Poland.
The schedule for the DTM cars will be FP1 from 16.30 to 17.00 on Friday (3rd June). For Saturday it is FP2 from 08.50 to 09.20, Qualifying from 10.30 to 10.50 and the 40-minute race starts at 15.28. On Sunday it is FP3 from 09.00 to 09.30, Qualifying from 11.30 to 11.50 and the 60-minute race starts at 15.13.
