Porsche factory driver Thomas Preining wins DTM season opener

Immediately after the start of Saturday’s race, Thomas Preining moved up one place to second. Thanks to a very quick tyre change by his Manthey pit crew, the 27-year-old Austrian took the lead after the round of mandatory pit stops. The 2023 DTM champion was able to defend this lead in his up to 416 kW (565 PS) Porsche 911 GT3 R until the safety car led the field across the finish line as a group. The reason was a competitor who’s car had broken down on the track shortly before the end of the race. The Porsche factory driver thus secured his second DTM home victory after 2022 and his fourth podium finish overall at Spielberg.

Bastian Buus, like Preining a former Porsche Junior, impressed on his DTM debut with fifth on the grid and the fastest lap of the race on Saturday. Driving the Land-Motorsport team’s nine-eleven, the Dane crossed the finish line in fourth place. Race control subsequently imposed a five-second penalty on the 2023 Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup champion for causing a collision. This dropped him back to 14th place. As a result, Ricardo Feller in the second Manthey Porsche moved up to ninth place. The Swiss driver had started from seventh position but had to serve a penalty lap for leaving the starting corridor and subsequently fought his way back into the top 10.

A challenging Sunday race for the Porsche trio

Buus started Sunday’s second race of the season from sixth on the grid as the highest-placed nine-eleven driver. He crossed the line in tenth place, thereby collecting championship points in the second DTM race of his career, too. The two Manthey teammates, Preining and Feller, secured 14th and 16th on the grid in qualifying. The pair finished in the points in 12th (Feller) and 13th (Preining). Due to his victory the previous day, Preining had to start the race with 20 kilograms of success ballast.

“We are delighted with Thomas Preining’s victory on Saturday and Bastian Buus’ strong driving performance on his very first DTM weekend,” summarised Maximilian Müller, GT Race Support at Porsche Motorsport. “On Sunday, the field was much closer in terms of performance. With outside temperatures having risen further compared to the previous day, we were unable to quite keep up with the front-runners from our midfield positions. All three Porsche 911 GT3 R scored points in both races. Overall, we can look back on a positive start to the DTM season.”

Driver quotes after the weekend

Thomas Preining (Porsche 911 GT3 R #91): “Winning my home race means a great deal to me. It’s something I’ll always remember. Sunday proved to be a difficult day for us. Out in the midfield, we weren’t able to make the most of our Porsche 911 GT3 R’s strengths as effectively as we would have been if we’d been leading the race on our own.”

Ricardo Feller (Porsche 911 GT3 R #90): “Unfortunately, I made a mistake in the first race. I’m very pleased with the comeback after the penalty lap. Qualifying on Sunday didn’t go at all as we’d expected. On a track like Spielberg, overtaking is difficult for us, so we didn’t manage to move up as far as we’d hoped.”

Bastian Buus (Porsche 911 GT3 R #29): “We got almost the maximum out of our overall package on both days. If we take the frustrating penalty from Saturday’s race out of the equation, we can be very proud of what we achieved with our new race car this weekend.”