From the racetrack Audi motorsport news

Apr 12, 2008

Ingolstadt/Hockenheim – Impressive début for the new Audi A4 DTM: Timo Scheider (Germany) and Mattias Ekström (Sweden) set the best lap times by a wide margin in Saturday’s qualifying for the DTM opening race at Hockenheim. This puts two of the new Audi A4 DTM cars on the front row of the grid for the race that is scheduled to start at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

As early as in the free practice sessions on Friday and Saturday morning the Audi drivers had set the pace. In the first segment of the three-part qualifying all four new Audi A4 DTM cars were running in front and easily made it into the last section as well. Audi was the only one of the two manufacturers to see all four new cars finish among the top eight.
 
The pole position was clinched by Timo Scheider in the GW:plus/Top Service Audi A4 DTM, who will thus be starting to a DTM race from the top grid position for the third time in his career. Alongside the German, title defender Mattias Ekström in the Red Bull Audi A4 DTM is on the front row. Scheider and Ekström were the only two drivers to set times below 1m 33s. Bruno Spengler in the quickest Mercedes on position three was almost four tenths of a second slower – an unusually large gap in the DTM.
 
Tom Kristensen will start the race from fifth place, Martin Tomczyk from position seven. Between the second and third qualifying section, the rear wheel camber of the A4 driven by the German was changed. This took longer than expected and meant that Tomczyk was prevented from using a second tyre set in the crucial, final section.
 
A surprising result was achieved by Oliver Jarvis: the 24-year-old driver of the Best Buddies Audi A4 DTM fielded by Audi Sport Team Phoenix immediately managed the leap into the top eight at his DTM début. This made the young Brit not only the best newcomer, but the quickest driver of a car from last year.
 
For the DTM season opener at Hockenheim advance ticket sales alone amounted to over 44,000. The race will start at 2 p.m. on Sunday. ARD will broadcast live from the Hockenheim circuit, starting at 1:45 p.m. (local time). For the first time, the revised DTM regulations requiring the two mandatory pit stops to be made only in the second third of the race will apply. Team orders are prohibited and – for the first time as well – TV will listen in on team radio communications during the race.