Porsche Leads DTM Practice at Nürburgring Amidst Heat

Porsche's Manthey team dominated the DTM practice session at the Nürburgring, with Thomas Preining clocking the fastest time of 1:25.517 in extreme heat conditions, reaching 36 degrees Celsius. Preining's performance placed him ahead of teammate Ricardo Feller, who finished second, 0.249 seconds behind.

In the session, Kelvin van der Linde and Marco Wittmann secured third and fourth places, respectively, while Nicki Thiim rounded out the top five. The HRT Ford drivers, Wiebelhaus and Maini, will face a drive-through penalty during the race due to a breach of testing regulations.

Despite the heat, practice was mostly incident-free, with a brief Full Course Yellow caused by Marco Mapelli's halted Lamborghini. Christian Engelhart, substituting for Maximilian Paul, improved his time in the Grasser Lamborghini but finished 16th overall. The first qualifying session is set for Saturday, with expectations for faster times as drivers adapt to the conditions.