Another blow for the DTM; Audi announces departure
F1 News
- GPblog.com
The DTM championship has been the fastest and perhaps most prestigious touring car championship in the world for several decades. In recent years, however, the class has been in heavy weather and has had to endure blow after blow. Audi is now announcing that they are pulling the plug on their DTM programme.
It's not the first time the DTM has been threatened in its existence. In the mid-1990s the original Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft came to an end. In 2000, however, there was a restart in the form of the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters, with which it retained the same abbreviation.
From 2004, Audi was officially involved in the class as a factory team, making it the longest-serving manufacturer after the departure of Mercedes in 2018. Now that Audi has also announced their departure after the 2020 season, BMW remains as the only manufacturer. Audi says it wants to focus more on sustainability and therefore prefers Formula E to the DTM.
Gerhard Berger, chairman of DTM organiser ITR, is obviously not happy with Audi's decision. In particular, he says he doesn't like the short term in which the manufacturer is announcing their departure. Both the DTM and BMW and the other teams will be surprised by this, according to him, and it remains to be seen what the sponsors will do.