DTM Zandvoort: Engel beats BMW duo van der Linde, Wittmann to pole

Having already topped the two practice sessions on Friday, Engel was also unbeaten in the 20-minute pole shootout on Saturday morning as he clinched the top spot with a time of 1m32.585s.

Porsche’s Dennis Olsen first broke Engel’s practice benchmark, setting a time of 1m33.279s with 10 minutes to go as Manthey EMA elected to complete its flying laps early on.

Olsen’s team-mate Thomas Preining then went on top with a 1m33.075s, but it wasn’t until the final three minutes of the session that a driver broke the 1m33s barrier, with Engel's team-mate Jusuf Owega lapping the circuit in 1m32.945s.

However, Owega’s reign on top turned out to be short-lived, with Engel finding another four tenths to snatch pole. His time would not be beaten, securing the 37-year-old his first pole since the Red Bull Ring round last year and the first pole for his Landgraf team since its switch from ADAC GT Masters.

Reigning champion van der Linde provisionally qualified second in his M4 GT3 with a time that was just 0.030s down on Engel, but he remains under investigation for impeding the German in qualifying.

Second place nevertheless respected a marked turnaround for van der Linde and BMW after the South African qualified 19th and 15th for the two races at Oschersleben.

Two-time DTM champion Marco Wittmann validated the improved pace of the BMW by qualifying third in his Project 1-run M4, albeit 0.297s down on Engel’s chart-topping time.

Works Lamborghini driver Franck Perera ended up just 0.001s adrift of Wittmann in fourth for SSR Performance.

Pole sitter Maro Engel, Mercedes-AMG Team Landgraf Motorsport

Photo by: Alexander Trienitz

Albert Costa, who is replacing Jack Aitken at the Emil Frey Racing Ferrari team this weekend while the Briton is on IMSA duty for Cadillac at Watkins Glen, qualified a strong fifth on his debut and pipped the second SSR Lamborghini of Mirko Bortolotti by 0.008s.

Owega’s time of 1m32.945s was good enough for seventh at the end, as he beat the top Audis of Abt driver Kelvin van der Linde and Orange1 team’s Patric Niederhauser.

Preining ended up 10th, ensuring all six manufacturers were represented inside the top 10.

Winward Mercedes driver Lucas Auer qualified 0.543s off the pace in 12th behind the Bernhard Porsche of Ayhancan Guven, while HRT Mercedes’ Luca Stolz was even further off the pace in 14th.

New BMW factory driver Dries Vanthoor, who has been called by Schubert to replace Rene Rast while the three-time champion is contesting the Portland Formula E round, qualified 16th for his DTM debut.

The first 23 of the 27 drivers were separated by just a second in a tightly-contested qualifying session on the DTM’s first visit to Zandvoort since 2018.

DTM Zandvoort: Qualifying results:

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Time	Gap
1	48	Maro Engel	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'32.585
2	1	Sheldon Van Der Linde	BMW M4 GT3	1'32.615	0.030
3	11	Marco Wittmann	BMW M4 GT3	1'32.882	0.297
4	94	Frank Perera	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2	1'32.883	0.298
5	14	Jack Aitken	Ferrari 296 GT3	1'32.926	0.341
6	92	Mirko Bortolotti	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2	1'32.934	0.349
7	84	Jusuf Owega	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'32.945	0.360
8	3	Kelvin van der Linde	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'32.993	0.408
9	83	Patric Niederhauser	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'33.053	0.468
10	91	Thomas Preining	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.075	0.490
11	24	Ayhancan Güven	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.084	0.499
12	22	Lucas Auer	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'33.128	0.543
13	8	Luca Engstler	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'33.137	0.552
14	4	Luca Stolz	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'33.162	0.577
15	40	Mattia Drudi	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'33.166	0.581
16	33	René Rast	BMW M4 GT3	1'33.172	0.587
17	7	Ricardo Feller	Audi R8 LMS Evo II	1'33.258	0.673
18	90	Dennis Olsen	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.279	0.694
19	27	David Schumacher	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'33.298	0.713
20	75	Laurin Heinrich	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.333	0.748
21	36	Arjun Maini	Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo	1'33.334	0.749
22	9	Tim Heinemann	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.459	0.874
23	19	Mick Wishofer	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2	1'33.493	0.908
24	63	Clemens Schmid	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2	1'33.664	1.079
25	99	Christian Engelhart	Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)	1'33.712	1.127
26	69	Thierry Vermeulen	Ferrari 296 GT3	1'34.129	1.544
27	6	Alessio Deledda	Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2	1'35.406	2.821
View full results