2015 Zandvoort Race 2

2015 Zandvoort Race 2
The Circuit Park Zandvoort in 2015.
Race Information
Date	12 July 2015
No.	187
Event	DTM Zandvoort 2015
Location	Circuit Park Zandvoort Zandvoort, North Holland, Netherlands
Format	60 min + 1 Lap
Lap length	4.307 km (2.676 mi)
Distance	39 laps / 167.973 km (104.374 mi)
Qualifying Result
Pole Sitter	António Félix da Costa
Team	BMW Team Schnitzer
Time	1:30.483
Fastest Lap
Driver	Timo Glock
Team	BMW Team MTEK
Time	1:33.635 on lap 15
Race Result
First	Second	Third
António Félix da Costa	Augusto Farfus	Bruno Spengler
Winner Team	BMW Team Schnitzer
Time	1:02:07.601
Race Guide
Previous		Next
2015 Zandvoort Race 1		2015 Spielberg Race 1

The 2015 Zandvoort Race 2, otherwise known as the DTM Zandvoort 2015 Race 2, was the eighth round of the 2015 DMSB Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters Championship, staged at the Circuit Park Zandvoort in Zandvoort, North Holland, Netherlands on 12 July 2015. The race would see António Félix da Costa charge to his maiden DTM victory as BMW dominated the second race of the weekend.

Indeed, having claimed second in the Saturday Race, da Costa would secure pole for race two in qualifying, beating Bruno Spengler by six hundredths. Augusto Farfus and Saturday winner Marco Wittmann were next up, while Miguel Molina and Pascal Wehrlein shared the third row for Audi and Mercedes respectively.

da Costa duly converted pole to the lead at the start, with a stunning getaway seeing the #13 BMW leave the rest of the field seemingly standing still. Indeed, Spengler was left to fend off the attentions of Spengler into Tarzan, while Molina kept a fast starting Daniel Juncadella at bay amid a series of small bumps and brushes.

Indeed, the minor contact on the opening lap would be a sign of things to come, as demonstrated on lap two as Adrien Tambay forced Maxime Martin off track. Martin tumbled to the back before assaulting Lucas Auer for 22nd as DRS came on-line, which saw more tight battles develop.

Yet the need to preserve tyres would play on the minds of several drivers, resulting in a brief stalemate before the pit window opened after the 20 minute mark. At that point several drivers, led by Bruno Spengler would sweep in for their stops, with Wittmann and Molina coming together at pit-out as the #1 BMW was released into the path of the #17 Audi.

Timo Glock would jump both as a result, while Spengler remained ahead of all three but was unable to exploit his warmed-up tyres. As a result all four would get caught behind Auer, who had opted for a long first stint, although the #22 Mercedes was quickly removed via an aggressive lunge from Wittmann that left Auer spinning on the circuit.

Moments later and a five car incident caused chaos, although Martin Tomczyk was the only retirement from two unrelated accidents. The German racer was taken out by Molina, who had lunged at the #77 BMW but only succeeded in forcing Tomczyk into a heavy whack against Juncadella, as behind Robert Wickens and Tambay took chunks off of each other.

The physical battles would last through to the final five minutes of the race, with Juncadella receiving another whack, this time from Edoardo Mortara. Elsewhere, Molina was elbowed wide by Pascal Wehrlein at Tarzan, which allowed Christian Vietoris to slip through too, before rain in the final minutes caused the field to back off.

Out front, meanwhile, an untroubled and almost pristine #13 BMW piloted by da Costa would cruise across the finish line to claim victory, half a second clear of Farfus. Spengler was next ahead of Glock and Wittmann, while Wehrlein put up a late rearguard action to hold sixth from Mattias Ekström. Vietoris was next up ahead of Tambay, while Paffett secured the final point in tenth.

Background

It was status quo at the head of the Championship hunt after the first race in Zandvoort, with Jamie Green having retained his eleven point lead. Mattias Ekström was next up in second, while Pascal Wehrlein had inched a point closer in third, moving to within two of the Swede. Edoardo Mortara and Robert Wickens likewise held station to complete the top five, while Adrien Tambay and Maximilian Götz were the only non-scorers left after the seventh round.

In the Teams' Championship it was gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG who had held onto the lead, and had managed to enhance their initiative by a single point to seven. Audi Team Abt Sportsline had held second ahead of sister squad Audi Team Rosberg, while BMW Team RMG had ascended to fifth. Audi, meanwhile, had inched away from Mercedes-AMG to increase their lead in the Manufacturers' Championship, while BMW had almost doubled their tally in a single race in third.

Entry List

The full entry list for the 2015 Zandvoort Race 2 is displayed below:

2015 Zandvoort Race 2 Entry List
No.	Name	Entrant	Constructor	Chassis	Engine	Weight
1	Marco Wittmann	BMW Team RMG	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
2	Gary Paffett	Euronics/BWT Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
3	Paul di Resta	Silberpfeil Energy Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,127.5 kg
5	Mattias Ekström	Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
6	Robert Wickens	Silberpfeil Energy Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
7	Bruno Spengler	BMW Team MTEK	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
8	Christian Vietoris	gooix/Original-Teile Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
10	Timo Scheider	Audi Sport Team Phoenix	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,125 kg
12	Daniel Juncadella	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
13	António Félix da Costa	BMW Team Schnitzer	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
16	Timo Glock	BMW Team MTEK	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
17	Miguel Molina	Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,125 kg
18	Augusto Farfus	BMW Team RBM	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
22	Lucas Auer	Euronics/BWT Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,127.5 kg
27	Adrien Tambay	Audi Sport Team Abt	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,120 kg
31	Tom Blomqvist	BMW Team RBM	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
36	Maxime Martin	BMW Team RMG	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,107.5 kg
48	Edoardo Mortara	Audi Sport Team Abt	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
51	Nico Müller	Audi Sport Team Rosberg	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,125 kg
53	Jamie Green	Audi Sport Team Rosberg	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
77	Martin Tomczyk	BMW Team Schnitzer	BMW	M4 DTM	P66 4.0l V8	1,105 kg
84	Maximilian Götz	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,125 kg
94	Pascal Wehrlein	gooix/Original-Teile Mercedes-AMG	Mercedes-AMG	C63 DTM	AMG 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
99	Mike Rockenfeller	Audi Sport Team Phoenix	Audi	RS5 DTM 15	Audi 4.0l V8	1,130 kg
Source:

Qualifying

Having dominated Saturday, BMW were once again the class of the field on Sunday morning, as António Félix da Costa claimed a maiden pole position, beating Bruno Spengler by over half a tenth.

Report

Augusto Farfus claimed third ahead of Marco Wittmann, as another BMW quartet was set to lead the field away on Sunday. Miguel Molina also managed to tag himself onto the quartet as the only non-BMW driver within three tenths of pole sitter da Costa.

With Pascal Wehrlein ended the session as the best of the Mercedes, as Audi and Mercedes tried to counter the BMW charge, although Timo Glock did manage to make it five BMWs in the top ten. Daniel Juncadella, Gary Paffett and Christian Vietoris had a better Sunday morning to put four Mercs in the top ten, with only two Audis in the top half of the field.

There were two Mercedes sharing the back row again, but it was Audi who looked set to endure a second dire Sunday afternoon in as many meetings, with Championship leader Jamie Green down in eighteenth. The only BMW straggler was Tom Blomqvist, down in 21st, as 1.200 seconds covered the entire field.

Results

The final qualifying result for the 2015 Zandvoort Race 2 are outlined below:

2015 Zandvoort Race 2 Qualifying Result
Pos.	No.	Name	Team	Time	Gap	Ave. Speed	Grid
1st	13	António Félix da Costa	BMW Team Schnitzer	1:30.483	—	171.360 km/h	1
2nd	7	Bruno Spengler	BMW Team MTEK	1:30.541	+0.058s	171.250 km/h	2
3rd	18	Augusto Farfus	BMW Team RBM	1:30.623	+0.140s	171.095 km/h	3
4th	1	Marco Wittmann	BMW Team RMG	1:30.650	+0.167s	171.044 km/h	4
5th	17	Miguel Molina	Audi Team Abt Sportsline	1:30.674	+0.191s	170.999 km/h	5
6th	94	Pascal Wehrlein	gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG	1:30.809	+0.326s	170.645 km/h	6
7th	16	Timo Glock	BMW Team MTEK	1:30.834	+0.351s	170.698 km/h	7
8th	12	Daniel Juncadella	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	1:30.850	+0.367s	170.668 km/h	8
9th	2	Gary Paffett	ART Grand Prix Mercedes	1:30.864	+0.381s	170.641 km/h	9
10th	8	Christian Vietoris	gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG	1:30.899	+0.416s	170.576 km/h	10
11th	36	Maxime Martin	BMW Team RMG	1:30.908	+0.425s	170.559 km/h	11
12th	48	Edoardo Mortara	Audi Team Abt	1:30.946	+0.463s	170.487 km/h	12
13th	77	Martin Tomczyk	BMW Team Schnitzer	1:30.970	+0.487s	170.443 km/h	13
14th	84	Maximilian Götz	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	1:31.039	+0.556s	170.313 km/h	14
15th	6	Robert Wickens	gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG	1:31.116	+0.633s	170.169 km/h	15
16th	5	Mattias Ekström	Audi Team Abt Sportsline	1:31.150	+0.667s	170.106 km/h	16
17th	27	Adrien Tambay	Audi Team Abt	1:31.218	+0.735s	169.940 km/h	17
18th	53	Jamie Green	Audi Team Rosberg	1:31.239	+0.756s	169.940 km/h	18
19th	99	Mike Rockenfeller	Audi Team Phoenix	1:31.308	+0.825s	169.812 km/h	19
20th	51	Nico Müller	Audi Team Rosberg	1:31.394	+0.911s	169.652 km/h	20
21st	31	Tom Blomqvist	BMW Team RBM	1:31.425	+0.942s	169.594 km/h	21
22nd	10	Timo Scheider	Audi Team Phoenix	1:31.491	+1.008s	169.472 km/h	22
23rd	3	Paul di Resta	Silberpfeil Mercedes-AMG	1:31.505	+1.022s	169.446 km/h	23
24th	22	Lucas Auer	ART Grand Prix Mercedes	1:31.719	+1.236s	169.051 km/h	24
Source:

• Bold indicates a driver's best/qualifying time.

Grid

The starting grid for the 2015 Zandvoort Race 2 is outlined below:

		3	Paul di Resta	1:31.505			31	Tom Blomqvist	1:31.425			99	Mike Rockenfeller	1:31.308			27	Adrien Tambay	1:31.218			6	Robert Wickens	1:31.116			77	Martin Tomczyk	1:30.970			36	Maxime Martin	1:30.908			2	Gary Paffett	1:30.864			16	Timo Glock	1:30.834			17	Miguel Molina	1:30.674			18	Augusto Farfus	1:30.623			13	António Félix da Costa	1:30.483
	22	Lucas Auer		1:31.719		10	Timo Scheider		1:31.491		51	Nico Müller		1:31.394		53	Jamie Green		1:31.239		5	Mattias Ekström		1:31.150		84	Maximilian Götz		1:31.039		48	Edoardo Mortara		1:30.946		8	Christian Vietoris		1:30.899		12	Daniel Juncadella		1:30.850		94	Pascal Wehrlein		1:30.809		1	Marco Wittmann		1:30.650		7	Bruno Spengler		1:30.541

Race

Another warm afternoon greeted the DTM field on Sunday afternoon, although cloud cover reduced the air temperature enough to give the engines a slight boost in performance. With BMW set to once again dominate the race, the question for the win was whether maiden pole sitter António Félix da Costa translate pole into a first career victory. With 60 minutes of racing, and a mandatory pitstop to boot, the race was set to provide non-stop action when the lights went out.

Report

A blistering start by the Portuguese youngster shot him into the lead of the race, as veteran Bruno Spengler seemingly stuttered with the rest of the field. Augusto Farfus almost found a way past the Canadian through Tarzan but thought better of it, as da Costa streaked ahead. Further down, Miguel Molina and Daniel Juncadella were flying the flags for their manufacturers in fifth and sixth through the first lap, as a few cars touched together, suggesting a physical race would emerge.

That was proven on lap two, as Edoardo Mortara slung a move down the inside of Maxime Martin into Tarzan for thirteenth, opening the door for Adrien Tambay. The Frenchman forced his way alongside Martin and was successful in running the Belgian wide for fourteenth, while the BMW bounced through the gravel. With DRS getting activated on lap four, the action was set to ramp up again until the pit stop window opened to scramble the order.

Martin recovered to 23rd after his bounce, and found himself battling Lucas Auer for 22nd, a place gained for the Belgian when he barged along the side of the Austrian through Tarzan. With the pit window opening on lap eleven (with 20 minutes already gone), Bruno Spengler led the charge for new tyres, which again led to some physical battles. Marco Wittmann and Miguel Molina demonstrated this by running together down the pitlane, before Wittmann turned across the front of the Audi as they came out and onto the circuit. Minor aero damage for both cars resulted, although it did allow Timo Glock to take the pair of them for fourth.

Their four way duel (which included Spengler in third) came across Auer whom had stayed out. That, as it turned out, was a mistake as Wittmann touched the side of the Mercedes with enough force to spin the Austrian into the gravel at Scheiviak, ending his day. More contact occurred moments later, when two unrelated incidents happened virtually at the same time, involving five cars and causing Martin Tomczyk to retire.

The first saw Robert Wickens and Tambay exchange a series of blows through the lap, before Daniel Juncadella had Tomczyk slam into the back of him. To be fair to the German, the fault actually laid with Molina, who misjudged the closing speeds and hit the back of Tomczyk with enough force to shunt him into Juncadella. Minor damage to the two Spaniards was little in comparison to the damage to Tomczyk's car, as he retired with a dislodged and damaged front frame.

As Jamie Green and Paul di Resta scrapped around the back of field, engulfing Wickens in the process, Juncadella was involved in another incident. On the run up to Scheiviak, Edoardo Mortara forced his way up alongside the Spaniard, before edging the Mercedes to the inside curbs. With nowhere to go, Juncadella ran up the curb with enough momentum to get airborne, albeit briefly as DTM cars are not designed to go in the air. That fact was confirmed upon the Spaniard's landing, which had enough force to break his front suspension and put him out of the race.

Wickens found himself in the wars once again, this time nerfed out of the way by Tom Blomqvist through Tarzan, the Canadian thrown into a spin. Molina, in the meantime, was given a taste of his own medicine by Pascal Wehrlein, who eased the Spaniard wide out of Tarzan and allowed Christian Vietoris to get past too. Mortara and Juncadella, meanwhile, were told to visit the stewards over their incident at the end of the race.

The final laps saw drizzle begin to fall on the circuit, although the 55 minutes of frantic action meant that water simply boiled off the circuit the moment it hit the surface. That said, there was no one who could deny a maiden win for da Costa, who eased off in the final laps to win by a little over half a second from Farfus. Glock missed out to Spengler for the final podium spot, while Wittmann went unpunished for his incident with Auer to claim fifth. Wehrlein and Mattias Ekström had a late duel for sixth that ended with the young German on top, as they finished as the best placed cars for their respective brands.

Results

The final classification of the 2015 Zandvoort Race 2 is displayed below:

2015 Zandvoort Race 2 Result
Pos.	No.	Name	Team	Laps	Race Time	Fastest lap	Pts.
1st	13	António Félix da Costa	BMW Team Schnitzer	39	1:02:07.601	1:33.872	25
2nd	18	Augusto Farfus	BMW Team RBM	39	+0.473s	1:33.694	18
3rd	7	Bruno Spengler	BMW Team MTEK	39	+1.091s	1:33.838	15
4th	16	Timo Glock	BMW Team MTEK	39	+1.710s	1:33.636	12
5th	1	Marco Wittmann	BMW Team RMG	39	+4.975s	1:34.009	10
6th	94	Pascal Wehrlein	gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG	39	+10.954s	1:33.857	8
7th	5	Mattias Ekström	Audi Team Abt Sportsline	39	+11.275s	1:33.947	6
8th	8	Christian Vietoris	gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG	39	+11.567s	1:34.239	4
9th	27	Adrien Tambay	Audi Team Abt	39	+11.910s	1:34.126	2
10th	2	Gary Paffett	ART Grand Prix Mercedes	39	+12.247s	1:33.728	1
11th	99	Mike Rockenfeller	Audi Team Phoenix	39	+12.661s	1:34.164
12th	17	Miguel Molina	Audi Team Abt Sportsline	39	+15.130s	1:33.932
13th	53	Jamie Green	Audi Team Rosberg	39	+15.942s	1:34.070
14th	3	Paul di Resta	Silberpfeil Mercedes-AMG	39	+16.456s	1:34.090
15th	10	Timo Scheider	Audi Team Phoenix	39	+16.853s	1:34.027
16th	84	Maximilian Götz	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	39	+18.319s	1:34.144
17th	36	Maxime Martin	BMW Team RMG	39	+29.708s	1:34.414
18th	31	Tom Blomqvist	BMW Team RBM	39	+32.670s	1:34.238
19th	6	Robert Wickens	Silberpfeil Mercedes-AMG	39	+52.235s	1:34.253
20th	22	Lucas Auer	ART Grand Prix Mercedes	39	+52.818s	1:34.625
NC	51	Nico Müller	Audi Team Rosberg	31	+8 laps	1:34.341
Ret	48	Edoardo Mortara	Audi Team Abt	21	Collision	1:34.129
Ret	12	Daniel Juncadella	Petronas Mercedes-AMG	21	Collision	1:34.004
Ret	77	Martin Tomczyk	BMW Team Schnitzer	16	Damage	1:34.137
Source:

• Bold indicates a driver started from pole.
• Italics indicate that a driver set fastest lap.

Milestones

• Maiden pole position for António Félix da Costa.
• Maiden victory for da Costa.

Standings

Jamie Green had retained the Championship lead despite failing to score in the second battle of Zandvoort, although his lead had been reduced to five points. Indeed, both Mattias Ekström and Pascal Wehrlein had moved onto 76 points across the two Zandvoort races, with the Swede deemed to be ahead on countback. Behind, Edoardo Mortara and Robert Wickens had slipped back from the lead group, while Maximilian Götz was the only pointless driver left in the field.

In the Teams' Championship it was gooix/Original-Teile Mercedes-AMG who had maintained the lead, and had increased their advantage to thirteen points. Audi Sport Team Sportsline had likewise held second, and had moved onto 103 points, while BMW Team RMG had ascended to fourth from ninth after two very strong races. Likewise, BMW had made great strides in the Manufacturers' Championship, having climbed above Mercedes-AMG to sit 40 behind leaders Audi.

2015 Drivers' Championship Pos. Name Pts. +/- 1st Jamie Green 81 ◄0 2nd Mattias Ekström 76 ◄0 3rd Pascal Wehrlein 76 ◄0 4th Edoardo Mortara 58 ◄0 5th Robert Wickens 57 ◄0 6th Bruno Spengler 52 ▲1 7th Marco Wittmann 49 ▼1 8th António Félix da Costa 43 ▲7 9th Christian Vietoris 40 ▼1 10th Gary Paffett 37 ▲3 11th Augusto Farfus 35 ▲5 12th Maxime Martin 32 ▼2 13th Miguel Molina 27 ▼2 14th Mike Rockenfeller 25 ▼2 15th Timo Glock 25 ▲4 16th Paul di Resta 23 ▼3 17th Martin Tomczyk 20 ▼3 18th Timo Scheider 16 ▼1 19th Daniel Juncadella 14 ▼1 20th Nico Müller 12 ◄0 21st Tom Blomqvist 6 ◄0 22nd Lucas Auer 2 ◄0 23rd Adrien Tambay 2 ◄0 24th Maximilian Götz 0 ◄0

2015 Teams' Championship Pos. Name Pts. +/- 1st gooix/OT Mercedes-AMG 116 ◄0 2nd Audi Team Abt Sportsline 103 ◄0 3rd Audi Team Rosberg 93 ◄0 4th BMW Team RMG 81 ▲1 5th Silberpfeil Mercedes-AMG 80 ▼1 6th BMW Team MTEK 77 ▲1 7th BMW Team Schnitzer 63 ▲3 8th Audi Team Abt 60 ▼2 9th BMW Team RBM 41 ▲2 10th Audi Team Phoenix 41 ▼2 11th ART Grand Prix Mercedes 39 ▼2 12th Petronas Mercedes-AMG 14 ◄0 2015 Manufacturers' Championship Pos. Name Pts. +/- 1st Audi 296 ◄0 2nd BMW 256 ▲1 3rd Mercedes-AMG 247 ▼1

Only point scoring drivers and teams are shown.

References

Videos and Images:

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