– What will happen to the planned Audi guest start in the 2026 DTM season? This year, the Ingolstadt team is not represented in the DTM field for the first time since the end of the old DTM in the 1990s, but at the Pirelli tire tests for the new DTM special tire before the season in Vallelunga, a completely surprising Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II appeared.
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The car, which was previously owned by Verstappen Racing, comes from the Seyffarth team competing in the ADAC GT Masters, which participated in the Pirelli test as preparation for planned DTM guest starts in the 2026 season. But what is the current situation regarding this?
“We will not start,” says team boss Tobias Seyffarth in an interview with Motorsport-Total.com – and explains the reasons for the cancellation. “If I do something like this, I want to do it properly and professionally – and also want to achieve a reasonable result,” he explains.
Pit stops as a special challenge
As a team, they are currently “not quite ready yet,” says Seyffarth. He points to the pit stops, which this year in the DTM are at an extremely high level for almost all teams – and usually take less than seven seconds. “Some say that a 6.8-second stop was not so good,” he says with a smile.
Besides that, the team would have faced an extremely challenging schedule with a DTM appearance: One week before the Sachsenring weekend (September 11 to 13), where the guest start was planned, the ADAC GT Masters guest event takes place at the Salzburgring in Austria. (SPONSORED LINK: Get tickets now for the 2026 DTM season!)
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And at the finale in Hockenheim, a guest start would not have been an issue anyway, as the ADAC GT Masters runs as a support event. “We are now focusing on the last two GT Masters weekends, and then we will see if it works out next year.”
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What the team plans for 2027 and what will happen to the DTM plan
By the way, the 21-year-old youngster Simon Connor Primm was supposed to be the driver, who this year drives the Audi of the officially registered team under the name HGL Racing together with the Pole Robin Rogalski. The duo is currently ninth in the overall standings two weekends before the end.
The season highlight so far was Sunday at the Lausitzring, where Primm took pole position and the duo finished second in the race – the only podium of the year. Next season, the team wants to stay with the Audi in the ADAC GT Masters – and a start in the GT Winter Series is also planned.
And the topic of a DTM guest start remains current. “We want to postpone that to next year,” Seyffarth announces. “We really want to do one or two guest starts in the DTM then.”
That will probably please the fans as well, because the Audi R8 LMS GT3 has always been one of the most popular cars in the field, which Seyffarth can also confirm from the ADAC GT Masters. “I see that every day when fan mail comes in here and we sign photos and autograph cards,” he says with a smile.
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