Bortolotti Reduces Preining’s Points Lead With Sunday Pole

Mirko Bortolotti secured his third pole position of the DTM season in Sunday qualifying at the Sachsenring, slashing Thomas Preining’s championship lead in half in the process.

The Lamborghini factory driver set a best lap of 1:17.366 aboard the No. 92 SSR Performance Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 to go fastest, becoming the first driver this season to claim more than two poles.

Jack Aitken came closest to toppling Bortolotti, steering the No. 14 Emil Frey Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 to a best lap of 1:17.514 in the closing minutes of the session to jump up to second.

Saturday race winner Luca Stolz rounded out the top three in the No. 4 Mercedes-AMG Team HRT Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo.

With his third pole of the year, Bortolotti reduced his gap to championship leader Thomas Preining by half.

As three points are on offer for the fastest driver in qualifying, Preining has seen his gap reduced to just three points compared to six after the first race on Saturday.

The Austrian driver qualified outside the top ten and will start this afternoon’s race eleventh in the No. 91 Manthey EMA Porsche 911 GT3 R.

Thierry Vermeulen slotted into fourth in the No. 69 Ferrari, ahead of SSR Performance’s Franck Perera and the No. 7 ABT Sportsline Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II of Ricardo Feller.

Maro Engel improved in the closing seconds of the session to move into seventh aboard the No. 48 Mercedes, with Kelvin van der Linde eighth.

Ayhancan Guven and Arjun Maini completed the top ten.

The second and final race of the weekend takes place at 1:30 p.m. CEST (7:30 a.m. EDT).

RESULTS: Qualifying 2