Exactly one month before the DTM season opener in Oschersleben and three months after his vertebral fractures in the Daytona crash, runner-up Lucas Auer returned to the cockpit on Thursday: the 28-year-old Austrian drove on the test day before the GTC race season opener in Hockenheim as part of the ADAC Racing Weekends in his Mercedes-AMG GT3 a total of 66 laps.
And impressed with absolute top times: In the evening session, Auer set a personal best of 1:37.911 in his Winward-Mercedes, which he will drive in the DTM again this year. That means he almost took pole position in last year’s ADAC GT Masters.
As a reminder: This year’s Bernhard DTM driver Ayhancan Güven drove a 1:37.899 in the Joost-Porsche in the second qualifying on October 23 and was only twelve thousandths faster than Auer on the test comeback.
Auer could have driven even faster
And the conditions are definitely comparable: Pirelli tires were used in the ADAC GT Masters, just like Auer did in Hockenheim. And the temperatures on April 27, at just under 20 degrees, were even slightly higher than in the morning qualifying session, which has a negative effect on engine performance.
An analysis of the lap times shows that even more would have been possible with Auer: If the Winward driver had combined his fastest sectors of the day in one lap, he would have been even 0.144 seconds faster and finished 1:37.767. In the overall standings, Auer’s Mercedes was the fastest of six GT3 cars. Only the LMP3 drivers drove better times in a field of 22 cars.
Encouraging: The first stint lasted twelve laps
Above all, it is encouraging that Auer was in action all day and made excellent use of the little more than three hours of testing time: In the first of four short sessions, which started at 9:00 a.m., the man from Kufstein was on the track immediately and was one of the first to set serious lap times.
His first stint lasted twelve laps, which is a good sign after his serious injuries.
This is the plan for Lucas Auer
What’s next for Auer? That will depend on how the Austrian feels after the test. At the official DTM test in Spielberg two weeks ago, when he wasn’t in the car and teammate David Schumacher did all the testing, he says that after his intensive rehab, he’s no longer in pain.
Winward team boss Christian Hohe Nadel, who was not present at Hockenheim, would like to give Auer the opportunity to familiarize himself with the Pirelli tires in private tests before the DTM season opener. In recent years, Auer has primarily concentrated on the DTM, in which Michelin tires were used.
Last year, however, Auer also completed five rounds of the GT World Challenge Europe long-distance series. That could now pay off, because in the SRO series, like this year in the DTM, the DHF tires from Pirelli were used.