DTM Portimao: Muller takes dominant win for Audi

Having qualified on pole position for the first time in the DTM’s GT3 era, Team Rosberg’s Muller was virtually unchallenged in Sunday’s 33 lap contest in Portugal, beating Fraga to victory by over three seconds.

The Swiss driver made a clean start from pole and was already a second up the road by lap 3, as Fraga moved past the Grasser Racing Lamborghini of Mirko Bortolotti to grab second.

Fraga was the first frontrunner to head to the pitlane, switching to a fresh set of tyres as soon as the pit window opened at the end of lap 6.

Muller dived into the pits a lap later to cover the Brazilian racer and duly rejoined the track with an increased lead of two seconds, with Bortolotti remaining behind the duo in third after his own pitstop on lap 8.

Fraga tried to put the pressure on Muller with the fastest lap of the race on the next tour, but the Team Rosberg driver was never really threatened as he cruised to a comfortable win with an extended margin of 3.4s.

It marked Muller’s first race win in the DTM since the 2020 season finale at Hockenheim, as well as the first for Team Rosberg since it propelled Rene Rast to a third title the same year as a full-factory squad.

Bortolotti couldn’t challenge either Muller or Fraga with 5kg of ballast on his Lamborghini, having previously led much of Saturday’s race until a technical issue struck him at the restart, but the third-place finish means he leaves Portimao as the championship leader.

Mirko Bortolotti, Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini Huracán EVO GT3

Photo by: Alexander Trienitz

Walkenhorst BMW driver Marco Wittmann rebounded from a DNF on Saturday to finish fourth in the second race of the weekend, passing the Winward Mercedes of Maximilian Gotz into Turn 1 at the start of lap