Maximilian Paul caused a sensation at the Nürburgring when the reserve driver snatched DTM victory – team boss Grasser explains what sets the youngster apart
He came, he saw and he won! Maximilian Paul celebrates his first career success on Sunday at the Nürburgring, in his fourth ever DTM race. “Max Paul is incredible“, “He has an incredible skill set. And the race was a poem. Everything fell into place there.”
“It’s so difficult for a young driver when you join a new team,” knows Grasser, whose racing team has now been successful on the world’s racetracks for twelve years. In that time, the Austrian has worked with countless young talents and factory drivers, but Paul is one of those special drivers.
“Every team has its own set-up philosophy,” explains Grasser. “But with him, you could already see in the training sessions how he adapts and improves. He has an insanely good feeling for a car like this.” Although the Lamborghini Huracan GT3 is well known to Paul, the performance at the Nürburgring was impressive.
Father & son with own GT3 team
“He also knows technically what’s going on,” Grasser reveals the young DTM driver’s particular strength. “That’s rare – this meticulous work and having an explanation for everything.” However, this knowledge does not come from nowhere: father Tobias Paul was active as a racing driver himself at the time and prepared his racing car on his own together with friends. Paul looked over his father’s shoulder and lent a hand himself.
The path was paved for a successful motorsport career: Paul sat on a motorbike for the first time at the age of four, followed later by his first kart races. Since 2019, the Dresden native has been competing in the ADAC GT Masters, where he has been on the podium several times and has been able to gain important GT3 experience.
Even setbacks did not slow the family down. After the insolvency of T3, for whom Paul had competed in the ADAC GT Masters, father and son continued with their own team, Paul Motorsport, to further the youngster’s career. That was actually an advantage in retrospect. “He screws along there, knows the technology. He really learned it from scratch,” GRT team boss Grasser appreciates.
Paul “prepares car himself “
Paul’s decision to step into the Grasser Lamborghini as a replacement for Mick Wishofer was made at short notice. “Gottfried called me a week and a half ago,” the 23-year-old reveals. “It was very spontaneous because the other driver dropped out. Everyone wants to drive DTM and now I’m here.” However, Paul already made his DTM debut two years ago, as a guest starter at the Red Bull Ring, back then in the Lamborghini of T3 Motorsport.
There, too, the Dresden-born driver caused a sensation with positions eleven and 13. T3 team boss Jens Feucht revealed to ‘Raceweek der Motorsport Podcast’ at the time: “What nobody knows: Max even prepares his car himself, regardless of whether the gearbox has to be changed or the engine removed.” So the young racer doesn’t just sit in the car on race weekends, but also works on his success between races.
“He does his set-up himself in the workshop beforehand, and he does it with a meticulousness,” said the T3 team boss. “He prefers to measure it three times so he knows the car is exactly the way he wants it to be.” This gives him a better understanding than any other racing driver, says Feucht.
“He can immediately tell the engineer: we have to do this and this,” the T3 team boss was convinced of his young driver’s qualities. “So he doesn’t need the engineer to tell him, he can tell what is missing or needs to be changed on the car right now. That makes him very complete. “
“Extraordinary for his age “
Grasser also knows how mature Paul already is for his age. “There was a situation in qualifying where he lost the car a bit, got into the dirt“, “That’s when we tried to find a good spot for him again. And his statement was, ‘Guys, I screwed up. And I’ll manage it again.’ For a youngster his age, he’s already exceptional. “
There were also the difficult conditions, as Paul took his first DTM victory on a rain-soaked track. “In these conditions it was extremely strong,” said Grasser. “In the rain, it’s always about driver quality as well. He more than proved that. Our job is to give him a reasonably good car. He did the rest. “