Stolz “Relieved” with Podium After Oschersleben Struggles

Luca Stolz was “relieved” to return to the DTM podium in the Sunday race at Zandvoort, bouncing back after a trouble-filled season opener at Oschersleben.

The German driver came home in third position behind race winner Ricardo Feller and Thomas Preining on Sunday, recording his first podium finish of the season.

Zandvoort brought an upturn in fortunes for the No. 4 Mercedes-AMG Team HRT crew after their struggles at the Oschersleben season opener a few weeks ago.

There, Stolz battled through a tough weekend that included a mid-weekend chassis change when the team brought in one of its Nürburgring 24 chassis as a temporary solution after the original chassis was damaged.

It couldn’t prevent Stolz from recording a double retirement at Oschersleben, after which the German received a new chassis to be used from Zandvoort onwards.

“A good day at the beach,” Stolz said about his Zandvoort performance.

“We already saw from Friday on that we were much better than in Oschersleben, because we basically had a new car.

“We had a broken chassis in Oschersleben so it’s great to come back like this.”

“Yesterday we already made some good steps in the right direction and I feel today we maximized some stuff. Relieved to be back on the podium.”

Stolz ran in sixth position when the mandatory pitstop window opened. A well-executed pitstop allowed him to leapfrog Marco Wittmann, while Patric Niederhauser fell away after serving a penalty for an unsafe release.

He then also made his way past Saturday race winner Maro Engel a lap later as the No. 48 Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo rejoined the track after its stop.

Stolz slotted into third place behind Thomas Preining as a result, where he would stay until the end of the race.

The German applauded his Haupt Racing Team mechanics for their quick work during the pitstop sequence.

“Credits to the guys,” Stolz said. “They work day and night to have good pitstops and we train a lot.

“Today it was a key thing, including switching on the tires quite quickly after the pitstop where we gained some positions. Today the guys in the pit crew made the difference.”

After the pitstops, Stolz came under pressure from Wittmann’s No. 11 Team Project 1 BMW M4 GT3.

“He was never close enough to send it,” said Stolz.

“In the closing stages, when he had a lot of traction, then it’s always hard to fight the BMW because it feels like they are 100 kph quicker.

“But as soon as he lost the tires a little bit, I saw that I was better on traction and I could always place myself well and then it was quite easy to defend.

“In the last laps, if I saw if I make no mistakes, then he would stay behind.”

Feller: Qualifying Red Flag Key to ABT Victory

Race winner Ricardo Feller said the late red flag in Sunday qualifying that allowed him to take pole position was a key factor leading to his second career victory.

Feller took a last-gasp pole earlier on Sunday, putting in a late flyer shortly after a red flag triggered by a spinning Alessio Deledda.

The Swiss driver then converted that pole position to a lights-to-flag win.

“Super happy that the red flag came out in qualifying, I think it was the key for us today,” Feller said.

“Then starting from pole, I went on to start the race and it worked out perfectly.”

Feller told Sportscar365 immediately after qualifying that the pole position came as a surprise, adding that the team got “lucky” as he was the first to rejoin the track once the session resumed.

“Normally when the peak of the tyre is gone, which already nearly happened in the first outing, then you cannot improve your lap time anymore.

“But I think today we were just lucky because we were the first car on the red light, so we were the first car to go out of the pit lane on a clean and free track.

“I could prepare my tyre properly. So it was not really an out lap, it was actually a flying lap, or a push lap, because I could lean on the tyre everywhere.

“I didn’t have to drive through dirt or something and then I just had one clean lap which put me on pole.”