South Africans can be proud of another great Motorsport achievement as Sheldon van der Linde takes first place at the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM).
This is the first DTM victory for a South African.
“The only 21-year-old BMW driver won the race thanks to clever tactics by his RBM team and courtesy of his driving skills on the soaked asphalt that gave many of his opponents a hard time,” said the DTM website.
This was an impressive win, as van der Linde had only started the race from 14th on the grid. He took top place after completing 31 laps in 1 hour 13 minute 27.930 seconds. He also completed the fastest lap of the race at 1 minute 35.854 seconds.
“A dream has come true. Winning the race after having started from 14th on the grid is actually unbelievable. It shows that simply anything can happen in the DTM. Of course, the weather helped us as well. Huge thanks to the entire team and to BMW,” said van der Linde.
“Our crew has done a tremendous job, the car handled really well. Assen is a good track to test the limits, something that worked out very well here. The restart was a bit tricky, but we were in control throughout. I am overjoyed.”
Picture: Ray Leathern/Facebook