Two collisions cost Mirko Bortolotti 28 points: Why Gottfried Grasser defends him after the crash with Kelvin van der Linde and why the Abt driver sees it differently
On Saturday Mirko Bortolotti was still remorseful after the crash with Felipe Fraga, on Sunday the Lamborghini works driver, who collided with Abt Audi driver Kelvin van der Linde three laps before the end in the fight for fourth place and retired again, left the Nürburgring without a word
but who was to blame for the crash out of the Mercedes Arena that saw Bortolottis retire with a broken tie rod after lurking in the rear of his rival for laps, as he had done the previous day? “In my opinion Kelvin has to open up there because they were side by side and he saw him”.
Grasser alludes to DTM leader Sheldon van der Linde, who is already 21 points ahead of Bortolotti after finishing ninth in the overall standings. But the fact that his protégé’s tie rod broke was “bitter, of course.
Kelvin van der Linde is surprised about Bortolotti’s manoeuvre
Now the black weekend – Bortolotti dropped 28 points despite strong form – has to be ticked off: “It is what it is. I think Kelvin will realise that, just like Mirko realised yesterday.”
Abt Audi driver van der Linde, however, sees the situation a little differently to Bortolotti’s team boss. “I didn’t expect him to drive so extremely to the right, because I was already far to the right. “
Bortolotti AGAIN with the crowbar! DTM Nürburgring pic.twitter.com/oZ931upICb
– Motorsport-Total.com (@MST_DTM) August 28, 2022
“If he had been clever, he would have stayed on the left, prepared the right side – and then he would have overtaken me quite easily. But like that, I didn’t really expect him to do that, I have to be honest. “
Kelvin van der Linde: “Puncture was a bit of bad luck “
Bortolotti had in fact already got alongside the Audi on the outside of the left-hand bend, but van der Linde would have expected him to back off, take a staggered line and accelerate with more speed onto the straight. But then things turned out differently.
“He was closer than before and I think I even heard him put the car in first gear to accelerate out of the corner with a bit more torque. I immediately opened the exit – and not expecting him to go any further to the right, I grabbed the corner. He then I think went over the kerb and still tried to make it work. “
Bortolotti then went off the outside of the track, “and I immediately thought I could hit back on the inside, but then unfortunately he had a puncture. That was a bit of bad luck. “
Brother’s title fight “not on his mind “
The fact that he was fighting against his brother’s title rival was not in the back of his mind during the duel with Bortolotti, the 26-year-old Abt Audi driver clarifies. “That was not in my mind. I had already seen that Sheldon had lost out due to the re-start chaos, so I wasn’t thinking about him. I was just trying to get the maximum position in.”
Instead, he said, there had already been a long rivalry between him and Bortolotti. “It goes way back with me and Mirko,” says Kelvin van der Linde. “We already had our rivalry in the GT Masters and we were never best friends. So I think it’s a bit of an ego battle as well. One wants to stay in front of the other – and sometimes it ends up like that. “
