Audi Shows Off New A5 DTM Cars

Exactly nine months or 275 days after its roll-out, the event where Audi Sport’s youngest baby will begin to run in earnest is now coming up. On April 29, 2012, the new Audi A5 DTM will go into its first race at the Hockenheimring.

Audi has already managed two impressive showings at season openers this year. With the Audi R18 TDI, Audi Sport Team Joest won the opening round of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) in the middle of March. On the Easter weekend, the WRT customer team was triumphant with the new Audi R8 LMS ultra at the first race of the FIA GT1 World Championship.

Now, the eagerly awaited DTM season opener, which marks the beginning of a new era for the popular touring car racing series, is following suit. For the first time since 2003, the DTM is racing with coupe cars. And for the first time in 20 years, the three big German premium manufacturers – Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz – are competing against each other again.

Despite several joint track tests – most recently at Valencia, Spain, and at the Hockenheimring – the relative strengths have not really been determined so far. Which of the competitors has done the best job of developing the new DTM vehicle generation will only become obvious – at the earliest – in the first qualifying event – and 24 hours later at the first race covering a distance of nearly 175 kilometres (both live on “Das Erste”).