Return to international calendar not "first focus" for new DTM bosses

Until 2020 the series was a silhouette touring car championship predominantly contested by manufacturer-financed teams, but the withdrawal of Audi prompted a reboot towards GT3 cars for 2021.

After two seasons of GT3 regulations, DTM promoter ITR was dissolved at the end of 2022 and the championship taken over by German organiser the ADAC, which moved to scale back the number of flyaway rounds and refocused on the German-speaking market.

Portimao, Imola and Spa were dropped, with trips to calendar returnee Zandvoort and the incumbent Red Bull Ring the only trips beyond Germany.

Speaking to Autosport, Voss said "as a short-term decision it was completely right" to shift the emphasis of calendar for 2023, because of the reduction in manufacturer support.

"We have to build up something like a new DTM, with a new philosophy," he said.

"Of course the GT3 cars are the same as we used before, but everything else is completely different.

"There is hardly no manufacturer support anymore; the main structure is now the race teams and we have to be much more focused on having the race teams in our series than having the last manufacturers."

As a result, Voss believes expanding the DTM to different territories and returning to Britain for the first time since 2019 will not be on the agenda in the near future.

Imola was among the circuits dropped from the 2023 calendar following DTM's takeover by the ADAC

Photo by: DTM

Former ITR boss Gerhard Berger had previously stated that taking the DTM back to the UK posed numerous difficulties amounting from Brexit, but wanted to see manufacturers from Britain, the United States and Japan join the current contingent of BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, Ferrari and Lamborghini.

"Of course we could go to Great Britain maybe to attract Aston Martin or McLaren or one of those manufacturers, but manufacturers are not in the same role as they have been over many years in DTM," Voss reiterated.

"Our first aim for the next two, three years will be to build up this brand again, so it should be famous in Germany again.

"We lost a little bit over the last five, eight years, I don’t know. Every middle of the year people were questioning if DTM will happen the next year again. We don’t have those discussions anymore.

"Now we have to work on the marketing and the surrounding and it’s much more easier for us as the ADAC to do it in Germany.

"I think expanding the series might be an aim for the next years, but not in the first focus."