Often unfairly referred to as 'Gerhard Berger's nephew', Lucas Auer has been forging his own path in motorsport - most recently finishing runner-up in DTM. 📝 james_newbold explains how the Austrian is emerging from a familial shadow ⬇️
George Russell isn’t the only Mercedes driver to have enhanced his reputation this year.
But against this backdrop Auer shone, and despite the Mercedes contingent being the biggest of the field the Austrian was its best qualifier on seven occasions. The next most successful Mercedes drivers by that metric were Maro Engel and his Winward team-mate Maxi Gotz on three apiece. Auer acknowledges that continuity has been an important factor in his strong campaign, having benefitted from working with the same team for the first time since 2018. That year was the last of Mercedes’ involvement in the DTM and prompted Auer to split from the brand he’d represented since his arrival to the series in 2015.
“Last year it took me some time to get familiar with the GT3, to find the last two tenths basically,” Auer says. “But once I found it, I was very confident, and staying with the same brand with the same team in the same championship really helped me. This I didn’t have for a long time, I was changing quite a lot the last years, so this gave me a massive boost in confidence.”
Auer knows he’s in a good position now to make good on that “massive experience” in 2023. Should he remain with Winward - and there’s no reason to expect that won’t materialise, given Auer says “we have a very healthy relationship” and - then he’ll automatically be regarded as one of the favourites next year.
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