Saturday’s DTM race at the Hungaroring saw Mercedes-Benz’ Paul Di Resta claiming his first victory of the 2017 season, after starting all the way from 13th on the grid.
The Team HWA AG driver benefited from an early safety car period, enabling the Scot to eventually take the lead from Audi Team Rosberg’s René Rast, whose late pit-stop cost the German every chance at a maiden DTM win.
“We had bad luck in qualifying today, but then the safety car helped us out. Things have a habit of balancing themselves out. But my tyres also allowed it,” commented 2010 DTM champion Di Resta.
“We knew we had to take an aggressive approach. But we managed to control the situation. The tyres degrade pretty quickly, and there’s a lot of wear. I held Timo [Glock] at bay, and he wasn’t close enough to attack.”
The first two race weekends of the 2017 DTM campaign went rather fruitless for the Mercedes driver, but with an eighth career win to his name, Di Resta is now hoping for this Saturday’s result to have a positive effect on the remainder of his season.
“Hopefully, that will now kick-start my season. Tomorrow, though, it will once again be difficult to beat Audi. But we have seen today that anything is possible. Consequently, we intend to get the maximum out of qualifying, and then we’ll see what happens in the race.”
Qualifying for the second race of this weekend’s DTM double-header at the Hungaroring will be live from 12:00 local time on Sunday, with the race starting just three hours later at 15:18 local time.