Drama came thick and fast at the second race of the DTM championship at the nurburgring gp circuit.
This 2021 season seems to have a trend of going to a yellow flag during the first lap. Unfortunately, this afternoons race was no different.
Liam Lawson, who started again from 11th on the grid, made it up to 9th by the time he crossed the line going into lap 2.
But Markus Buhk was nudged from behind which sent him drifting off into the pit lane barrier. The driver was OK and a yellow flag was flown.
The race restarted at the start of lap 4 and once again Lawson made up more places as another incident occurred.
SSR Performance’s new Porsche did not have the ideal start they would have hoped for when it came into contact again.
The green Porsche was pushed from behind by Max Gotz barging him off track sending debris into the air. Similarly, Stolz and Ellis almost seemed to copycat the move only milliseconds later.
Lawson benefitted by moving up to fourth with a great inside line, avoiding the drama alongside him.
He then took the chance to make his mandatory pit stop at the start of lap 7.
The pit stop went ahead with no issues. Lawson exited pit lane in front of those who had already pitted due to crashes.
Lawson made it onto track but had Max Gotz hot on his tail in the BWT Mercedes. It usually takes half a lap for DTM vehicles to get their tyres up to speed.
The RedBull Ferrari was just staying in front with Lawson pushing it around every corner. But Gotz got too close and made slight contact with the back of Lawson’s car.
Two corners later and a smoke screen had started to billow out of Lawson’s rear left wheel arch.
The Kiwi then had to take the run off as his car became less and less under control. He then immediately headed into the pits for a 2nd time.
After his second stop in the space of 2 laps, Lawson went down to 20th position.
But a second yellow flag helped him regroup with the pack soon after.
A typical speedy Lawson seemed to profit from the yellow flag restart as he swiftly gained 5 places and move from 19th into 14th.
But all that promise was quickly cut short when Lawson was once again caught up in another collision.
Lawson ran alongside his rival Kelvin Van Der Linde in a competition of “who can brake the latest”. Both cars were rubbing as they sped into the turn 13 chicane.
Several cars went off line, one car span, and another was sent down the escape route.
But Lawson hit more bad luck with another puncture this time on the right rear tyre. The team then decided to retire the car with 9 minutes to go.
An extremely bad spell of luck for Lawson in Germany. He will not be happy with either of the results but for the most part they were out of his control.
Unfortunately, due to not scoring any points over the 2 races he has now moved down to 5th in the championship but is still in fighting contention.
The next round of the DTM championship is at the RedBull ring in Austria from the 2nd – 5th of Septmber. It will be a home race for the team so they will be praying for better luck.
Here are the final classifications:
Featured image source: YouTube.com/autocarindia
