DTM: Wickens beats di Resta to Norisring pole

Robert Wickens will start the Norisring DTM race from pole position for the second year running, after putting in a stunning set of laps on the streets of Nuremberg.

With Mercedes living up to its practice hype and getting five cars into the top eight, pole position became a straight fight between Wickens and his HWA teammate Paul di Resta in Q3.

Both drivers were almost immediately into the 47sec bracket, which hadn't been done up until that point, with di Resta sitting on top with a few minutes left. But a late string of fast laps made the difference for Wickens, the Canadian first leap-frogging di Resta, and then lowering his own best time to a 47.883s to ensure pole position.

"I was expecting it to be better here [for Mercedes], but I didn't know it would be this good," said Wickens.

Jamie Green was third and the best-placed Audi on the grid. The Briton almost didn't make it out of Q2, his very last lap earning him a spot in the top eight. However, once he was in the final segment of qualifying Green was able to shine, becoming the only driver other than Wickens and di Resta to break into the 47s bracket.

The Mercedes trio of Pascal Wehrlein, Gary Paffett and Christian Vietoris finished fourth, fifth and sixth, while Mattias Ekstrom was seventh. Points leader Marco Wittmann took eighth, having been the only BMW driver to make it through Q2.

For the first time this season, there was a mixed bag of makes at the other end of the grid rather than a group of Mercedes. Of those eliminated from Q1, there was one Mercedes (Vitaly Petrov), two Audis (Edoardo Mortara and Timo Scheider), and two BMWs (Martin Tomczyk and Antonio Felix da Costa).