Third place grid start for Liam Lawson in race 2 of round 6 in Assen

Yesterday Lawson had an added 25 kilos of success ballast on board but still managed to hold on to a 3^rd place finish from pole position.

Today he has qualified 3^rd and will again have added weight but this time only 15 extra kilos.

Qualifying is always crucial in DTM with the ballast affecting the front runners heavily as the race progresses.

Early in qualifying Lawson slotted into 9^th with 11 minutes remaining and set a decent benchmark time to improve on.

Temperatures on track were down from yesterday with the outside air temperature only reaching 13 degrees for qualifying.

Once again searching and gunning for that #1 qualifying spot, with 2 mins to go Lawson set a 1.32.501 and shot up to provisional pole.

Just as Lawson crossed the line further back in the field Sophia Florsch overcooked it and span into the gravel causing the session to be red flagged.

Many drivers’ laps were cancelled as they were forced into the pits earlier than expected. Notably, Kelvin Van der Linde had kept it until the last minute to exit the pits and attempt a flying lap.

Following the retrieval of Florsch’s Audi from the gravel it was a rush for all teams to get out of the pits and set a faster lap than provisional polesitter Lawson.

Only 2 minutes remained on the clock leaving enough time for an out-lap and one flying lap. Kelvin Van der Linde was all the way down in 21^st and had just one lap to try and move his way up the grid.

Lawson also re-joined the track in an attempt to improve on his lap but couldn’t improve and was topped by yesterday’s winner Marco Wittman in second and Auer who took pole position.

The Kiwi missed out by just 8 thousandths of a second but gained 1 championship point for that result. Wittman who qualified 2^nd gained 2 points therefore moving him above Kelvin in the standings into 2^nd and is now just 7 points away from Lawson.

With 15 exta kilos added to his Ferrari, 10 kilos less than yesterday, it will be interesting to see how Lawson goes. Ahead of him Auer has no ballast but Wittman will have the full 25 kilos of success ballast so may be disadvantaged moving into the later laps.

Here are the top 20 qualifiers:

_{Featured image source: twitter.com/liamlawson30}