Rene Rast has recounted his fascinating finish to the second DTM race of the Lausitzring round, in which he lost a thrilling duel for victory against Jack Aitken.
Rast undercut the Emil Frey Ferrari driver in the first round of pitstops, but eventually succumbed to Aitken’s pressure on the penultimate lap.
“We always [kept] a little gap, but unfortunately we were not fast enough at the end,” Rast commented, explaining: “My tyres from yesterday's race were just at the end of their life when we put them on already. I had no grip, so I could not really defend hard.
“I think there was a bit of carcass peeking out of the tyre and we were completely done,” the BMW driver grinned. “I couldn't accelerate out of the corners. I had such poor traction and I knew he could only really pass on the outside.”
Aitken’s “pretty good” tyre management was hailed as a key factor in his victory by Emil Frey technical director Juerg Flach, in an interview with Autosport's sister publication Motorsport-Total.
Aitken was significantly faster in the late stages of the race. “Rast's front tyres gave up,” Flach added. “As a result, Jack made up almost four seconds in three laps. And the overtaking manoeuvre was magnificent.”
Aitken explained: “For me, the first sector was the strongest, so I could really attack him there. I was just looking at any place where he left a gap, and in the end it was the outside of [Turn] 6.”
Rast was powerless to hold his rival off: “I gave him the outside, but he still had so much grip that he was able to keep up on the outside - my tyres had nothing left to give. Of course, I could have bumped him a bit, but we all know what happens then!
“It was cool racing. We always left each other space on the outside or inside. That's how it should be. Obviously, it was a bit too tight for my taste at the end with Jules, but yeah, it was nice racing.”
Winward-Mercedes’ Jules Gounon also tried to attack Rast in the final metres. “I tried to go out of the last corner, but I could not put the power down because my rear wheels were just spinning all the way,” said the German.
“I saw Jules still had good traction... he put himself on my left-hand side and we had a drag race to the finish line. Sometimes he was pulling ahead, sometimes I was pulling ahead,” Rast added after finishing with a 0.045s gap in his favour.
“It was just a bit of a nightmare in that situation because you cannot do a lot. You just sit there. I was watching Jules, he was watching me, and each of us was just hoping to be ahead of the other one. I don't know what the gap was at the end, but it was probably the closest finish I ever had with anybody.”
