Néstor Girolami finished the second World Touring Car Cup (WTCR) race in third place on the road, but a thirty-second time penalty would eventually drop him down to eleventh in the official results.
The Münnich Motorsport driver had qualified on pole position for this race, but even before the penalty was applied, the Argentine’s chances of victory had already slipped away.
Whereas the Honda had looked like a better package than the Lynk & Co in the previous race, Cyan Racing had clearly made progress in their set-up overnight.
Able to stick with him through the Nordschleife, Yann Ehrlacher and Thed Björk both managed to pull off overtakes against Girolami once the cars reached the Döttinger Höhe straight on consecutive laps.
With the two bright blue cars escaping off into the distance, the race stewards then rubbed salt into the wound by penalising him for a starting procedure infringement.
Penalties aside, Néstor Girolami has his sights firmly set on where the Münnich Motorsport team can improve next time out.
“We did a very good start, the first lap was very fast and we could make a gap to Yann [Ehrlacher],” he began. “Then in the last sector, I think the Lynk & Co was really fast on the straight and he overtook me easily.
“It’s something that we need to work on. Straight-line [performance] is not our best and we need to have a look at the data to see how we can improve our speed as Sector 5 was our worst.
“I didn’t know that I had a penalty, and when I finished across the line they informed me that we received a penalty because we passed through the pit-lane twice [during the reconnaissance laps before the race start] and it was not allowed.”
Next up on the WTCR calendar is the Slovakiaring, a venue which has been notably unkind to Lynk & Co last year, whrre Girolami will be hoping to make a significant dent into the 31-point gap between himself and championship leader Yann Ehrlacher.