BoP trouble and curious tire strategy at BMW: "There is artificial intervention"

– Not only at Manthey and Porsche, but also in the BMW camp, there is a bad mood after the Norisring weekend: While Kelvin van der Linde could not start on Sunday after Saturday’s crash and remained without points, local hero Marco Wittmann’s frustration over the Balance of Performance (BoP) was enormous.

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“I think we gave everything – maximized once again,” he says after finishing tenth on Sunday to ran.de. “But in my opinion, there must now be drastic consequences, because there is artificial intervention here, and we are being made extremely slow.”

That was already the case the weekend before the Norisring. “It’s now four races,” he says. “We also had no chance at the Lausitzring, had to start from the back – now again.”

“At some point, you have to take proper action”

At the same time, some rivals are able to “take maximum points” four times in a row, which means he is losing ground in the championship. “We arrived here seven points behind,” says Wittmann. “You can check for yourselves how far behind we are now.”

Since Wittmann only scored six points at the Norisring with a tenth-place finish after retiring on Saturday, the gap for the best-placed BMW driver in the overall standings has grown from seven to a hefty 40 points.

The Franconian, who is in fifth place, does not understand why the BMW M4 GT3 received only slightly more boost pressure in the two BoP changes on Saturday after qualifying and after the race. On Sunday, the vehicle also became ten kilograms lighter.

“We were seven tenths behind from Practice 1,” he notes. “That was confirmed throughout the weekend. It was like that at the Lausitzring – and at some point, you have to take proper action to keep it fair for everyone.”

How catastrophic BMW’s current starting positions are

Apparently, the classification of the BMW with the new turbocharger is not entirely easy this year: This is due to the fact that the vehicle – as one hears – becomes disproportionately faster over the course of the weekend than the competitors’ cars.

The catastrophic starting positions of the BMW drivers are currently striking: On Saturday, Kelvin van der Linde and Wittmann qualified 17th and 18th at the Norisring, and on Sunday, Wittmann started 18th again. Two weeks earlier at the Lausitzring, it was only marginally better: On Saturday, Wittmann and van der Linde started 18th and 19th, and on Sunday, eighth and eleventh.

What causes astonishment among the competition: Wittmann completely refrained from a qualifying simulation in Nuremberg on Friday in free practice. And this, even though overtaking on the street circuit is difficult and qualifying is currently considered the BMW’s weakness. And then there was the new DTM special tire, for which there was no experience at the Norisring.

Why does Wittmann forgo a qualifying simulation?

Wittmann even had the new set of tires, which every driver receives on Friday, mounted in the second free practice session. However, it was then replaced after only one lap by a used set of tires.

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What was behind it? “Marco did not complete a qualifying simulation during free practice at the Norisring because, after Kelvin’s qualifying simulation, we decided for strategic reasons to use this set of tires for the race,” explains a BMW spokeswoman about the approach.

This sounds unusual, because the two tire pots are strictly separated in the DTM: one contingent is intended for free practice and tests, the other, which at the Norisring consisted of only three sets, for both race days. BMW, however, speaks of having saved the Friday set “for the race”. How is that possible?

Competitors suspect BMW trick

Indeed, a Friday tire set can be used as a so-called “puncture set” – i.e., if a tire puncture occurs during the race outside the pit stop window and an additional set is needed for the second stop. In that case, however, the chance of a good result would be very low anyway.

“That makes no sense to me,” says a leading team member of the competition, who wishes to remain anonymous. “Why should I save a set of tires for that when I could instead do a qualifying simulation, which I definitely don’t want to miss, especially at the Norisring?”

Another team member, however, sees an opportunity in the regulations to bring an almost new tire into the contingent: To prevent a team from not having enough tire sets available in the two-stop race on Sunday due to damaged tires, these may even be replaced before the start of the race by “tires from free practice” according to a clarification of the regulations. This must be approved by the Technical Delegate.

The fact that Wittmann only completed one lap with the new set on Friday would support this theory, because a scrubbed tire gets up to temperature faster in the race than a completely new tire. “That would be optimal, but then you would have to speculate that a set breaks – that would be very unusual,” says the team member, who also wishes to remain anonymous.

“Would never forgo a quali run at the Norisring”

In his opinion, they would “somehow manage” to get tires replaced due to damage, but doubts about the strategy remain even for him. “For the Norisring, it makes little sense to me overall. I would never forgo a quali run there,” he also alludes to the low degradation on the street circuit.

Forgoing a qualifying simulation also does not make the job easier for the BoP officials: Because the vehicles are often brought into the Dekra box on Friday after fast laps to check weight and fuel quantity. This time, they only had data from van der Linde’s car.

The upcoming weekend in Oschersleben (all info on TV times, stream etc.) will now be particularly important for BMW: Because a strong result is needed at Schubert’s home race, even though the track doesn’t really suit the M4 GT3 Evo, so that they don’t completely lose touch in the championship.

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