DTM

Ekström: “It was a highly entertaining race”

1 Mins read
Credit: Audi Media Centre

Mattias Ekström‘s second place finish at the Moscow Raceway handed the Swede the lead of the DTM Series championship.

The Swede dropped to third in the championship after Saturday’s race following a damage limitations race which saw him finish in eighth place after contact with Timo Glock on the opening lap.

For Sunday’s race, Ekström had qualified third but was promoted to second following Tom Blomqvist‘s disqualification after not enough fuel was in his BMW to take a sample.

“This was a crazily wild race,” the Swede commented at the finish. “A bit hardcore, but racing like this is fun. Taking the points’ lead after a cool race is even better. Congratulations to Maro (Engel), he deserved this win. I only needed one more lap, then I probably would have caught him.”

Ekström started alongside Bruno Spengler with the pair battling it out and the former getting the move done on the BMW driver on lap 12.

Rather controversially, Ekström was aided by his Audi team who got team-mate Nico Muller to back the pack up so he could catch and pass them towards the end of the race.

“In the beginning, I was battling for the lead with Bruno. On the long run, I was faster and able to overtake him. As a result of the safety car, the cards were reshuffled. From then on, it was a highly entertaining race. In the end, I’m very happy with second place today, 20 points from qualifying and the races, plus the lead of the standings.”

Ekström’s pace towards the end was most apparent when he was able to pass Marco Wittmann and catch Engel in the space of a lap to cross the line 0.374 seconds behind the race winner.

Following this result, Ekström now leads the championship by one point over stablemate Rene Rast.

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An NCTJ accredited Journalism Graduate covering DTM and the FIA Formula 3 Championship.
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