The professional soccer players of FC Ingolstadt 04 have swapped their training ground at their home base, the Audi Sportpark, for the Audi driving experience center in Neuburg. After a welcome and briefing, the players, coaches, and support staff of the long-standing Audi partner club completed varied training sessions with Audi models. Divided into two groups, the “Schanzers” first mastered a training session with driving safety as the focus on the wet asphalt of the 30,000-square-meter dynamic skidpad. Then later, they experienced the sportiness of the Audi R8 high-performance sports car delivering 620 hp during a few fast laps on the handling track, all under the guidance of five-time Le Mans winner Frank Biela.
Last October, Audi Sport moved from Ingolstadt to Neuburg. What are the working conditions like? What’s the feedback of the teams that prepared the new race cars before the beginning of the 2015 season in Neuburg for the first time? The teams were as enthusiastic as our own employees. The new environment offers completely different working conditions. The job of preparing new cars is a lot more enjoyable from everyones point of view. This has been a unanimous verdict and reflects my feelings too! LMP forms the spearhead of the motorsport commitment. How do you view the development of LMP since its formation? The development of the Le Mans prototypes is a success story in motorsport. Ever since the FIA has been licensing a World Championship you can tell that interest in this series in international motorsport has massively increased. The regulations that have been jointly worked out are extremely focused on the future. Consequently, manufacturers can demonstrate their technological expertise in motorsport which in turn benefits the customers, as efficient and eco-conscious driving is the direction that is being pursued for road vehicles as well. The DTM is the second factory-backed program. How important is the DTM for Audi? ´The DTM is very important for Audi. It’s a very product-related championship and we’re in direct battle with our main competitors in the premium class – BMW and Mercedes. On the race track, you can immediately recognize the base models. These road-going vehicles directly compete with each other in the market place as well. We tackle this challenge on the race track with the RS 5 DTM, one of the brand’s sportiest road-going models. The DTM weekends have received a new format for 2015. What’s the philosophy behind this? We’d like to deliver even greater motorsport to the fans over a weekend. By introducing two races per event the fans are clearly getting more DTM per weekend than before.
The ice hockey players from ERC Ingolstadt and team members of FC Ingolstadt caught a whiff of racing air with Audi’s DTM squad in the heart of Nuremberg. Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler-Thumann, shareholder of the Schaeffler Group, visited the DTM weekend as well.
But the round in Nuremberg is not only a home race for the brand from Ingolstadt. The Schaeffler Group, one of Audi’s partners in the DTM, is at home in Herzogenaurach. 1,000 employees of the company visited the third DTM race weekend. The Hoffmann Group was in Nuremberg with several hundred employees and customers as well.
Four days of coursework for Green at the ‘Audi Akademie’ in Ingolstadt, focusing on language that includes technical motorsport jargon and improvements in conducting media interviews. It will not be the last German course for the ambitious Brit. “I have many interviews during the race weekends, often not only in English. I also want to be able to speak to my team in German,” says Green.
The 27-year-old professional race driver, who is currently the runner-up in the standings of the North American TUSC racing series, picked up his RS 4 Avant in Misano Red pearl effect color at the Audi Forum Ingolstadt on Tuesday.
Audi’s DTM squad welcomed prominent visitors from other sporting disciplines at the Nürburgring: ex-ski star Maria Höfl-Riesch and Ralf Hasenhüttl, coach of FC Ingolstadt 04 that recently won promotion to the Bundesliga, met with the two Audi DTM drivers Jamie Green and Timo Scheider. Hasenhüttl additionally enjoyed a ride in the Audi RS 5 DTM race taxi. On duty as ‘taxi drivers’ for Audi at the Nürburgring were the GT race drivers Kelvin van der Linde and Stefan Wackerbauer.
The team from Walluf in Hessen will contest the 24 Hours of Dubai in January with two of the GT3 sports cars from Ingolstadt. Furthermore, team Boss Peter Schmidt confirmed participation in the entire international endurance championship 24H series. In addition, the team is also negotiating with drivers to race in the Blancpain GT Series and ADAC GT Masters.