The Lamborghini team Grasser kept its promise and officially appealed the disqualification of Mirko Bortolotti at Oschersleben (Motorsport Arena Oschersleben) within the required 96-hour limit. The German motor sports federation (DMSB) has already confirmed this. Now, the team has one week to explain the appeal in writing. After that, a court meeting will take place at the DMSB appeal court in Frankfurt, where it will finally become clear if the disputed wheel bearing is fully legal according to the technical rules.
Even though such cases often take a lot of time, DTM and ADAC are ready to act quickly. ADAC motorsport boss Thomas Voss promises in a conversation with Motorsport-Total.com that the appeal will definitely be reviewed before the end of the season. The organizers want the championship final and celebration in Hockenheim to happen calmly and without any problems. Team boss Gottfried Grasser says that he is completely sure he is right and that their technical part did not break any rules.
This case has a direct and very big effect on the current championship. Until the appeal court makes its final decision, the official result is temporary, with Maro Engel listed as the winner. If Grasser wins the appeal and Bortolotti's result returns, the situation will change a lot: Maro Engel will lose 5 points, and his closest rival, Thomas Preining, will lose 4 points. As a result, the points between the leaders will become equal, and Preining will move to first place. The third and fourth-place drivers (Auer and Thiim) will also lose one point each.
The case has one more difficult part - the „success ballast." If Engel loses his win from Oschersleben, it means he raced at the Nürburgring with the wrong weight (using a 20-kilogram ballast for 25 points instead of a weight for 20 points). However, article 26.2 of the sports rules clearly says that during ongoing processes, the ballast is shared based on the temporary result of that moment, and protesting past race results again is not allowed. At Mercedes-AMG, they are not making a big drama out of this situation. As sports director Thomas Jäger notes, despite the strange situation, Maro Engel handled the heavy weight very well at the Nürburgring, and the team is not wasting extra energy on this.