the wait is over. Although the DTM is one of the championships with a more compact calendar, the winter and the pre-season have come to an end and the german contest opens its doors to a new and exciting season. After a first year under GT3 regulations, the series has the objective of consolidating its product. And to be honest, the arguments could not be better. 29 GT3 vehicles, six represented manufacturers and drivers of 15 nationalities shape one of the most competitive grids in DTM history.
The first event of the 2022 DTM will take place in Portimao, an unprecedented scenario for the series until this year. In fact, the drivers and teams have been able to get to know the Portuguese track first-hand by completing two of the four official test days at its facilities. A route that is a real ‘roller coaster’ due to the great undulations of the terrain and that always draws a challenge for the set-up of the cars. With 4,653 meters of rope and 15 curvesPortimao will be the first stage of this promising DTM.
An adjective that does justice to the contest seen the talent present on a grid that has up to eight Mercedes-AMG GT3. The firm from Stuttgart is the one with the greatest presence at the event, hand in hand with lThe Winward, HRT, Mücke and GruppeM teams. Team Winward has reigning champion Maximilian Götz, as well as Lucas Auer and debutant David Schumacher. For their part, Arjun Maini and Luca Stolz will compete for the HRT team, while Maximilian Buhk repeats with Mücke. Maro Engel and Mikaël Grenier appear for the GruppeM team.
With six GT3 vehicles both Audi and Lamborghini compete. The firm with the four rings distributes its cars between Team Abt -three vehicles-, Team Rosberg -two- and Attempto Racing -one-, with pilots at the level of Kelvin Van der Linde, René Rast or Nico Müller and by the young talent of Ricardo Feller, Marius Zug and Dev Gore. For its part, four of the six Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo will be in the hands of GRT Grasser with Alessio Deledda, Rolf Ineichen, Mirko Bortolotti and Clemens Schmid as drivers. In T3 Motorsport they compete Nicki Thiem and Esmee Hawkey.
Four BMW M4 GT3s compete in the DTM under the control of Walkenhorst and Schubert. At the controls of him will be Marco Wittmann, Esteban Muth, Philipp Eng and Sheldon Van der Linde. The Porsches from Team Bernhard -one- and SSR Performance -two- close the grid with Thomas Preining, Laurens Vanthoor and Dennis Olsen and the two AF Corse Ferraris, with Felipe Fraga as a regular driver and Sébastien Loeb as a substitute for Nick Cassidy in Portugal. Just because of the debut of the nine-time WRC champion, the presence of several DTM champions and genuine GT3 racing specialists, the emotion is more than guaranteed.
Schedules of the DTM 2022 at the PORTIMAO circuit
Photos: DTM