In the final stage of Race 2 at the Sachsenring, Elia Erhart driving an Audi R8 entered by EFP by TECE held off a determined challenge from his pursuers to cross the finish line in first position. Thanks to the brilliant strategy of his team, he emerged from the pits in the lead after taking over from Pierre Kaffer in the cockpit. Kaffer delayed the pit stop until a safety car eventually slowed the field down. At that point, the other cars had already stopped for the mandatory change of drivers.

When the first of the three safety car periods came to an end halfway through the race, most of the other drivers came in for the mandatory changeover, but not you. How did the team come to this decision?

We had actually wanted to pit at the end of the safety car deployment ourselves. But when so many other cars pitted at the same time, we knew we had to go for a countercyclical strategy. So we stopped later, shortly after the next safety car came out. Even when the race was red-flagged at the start, I had the feeling that something was in the air and that we could get a good result with the use of clever tactics. We took a gamble to achieve this result. But even without, we would almost certainly have finished in the Top Ten anyway.

What was it like for you when the team made that decision?

I was with my race engineer the whole time. After it became clear just how important the tactics were going to be, it was a matter of choosing the perfect time for the pit stop. We were, of course, also in contact with Pierre in the car.

When the safety car was on the track and hadn't reeled your car in as race leader, it must have been difficult to keep tabs on the situation. How was it for you?

Yes, that was also the case for us. The team told me that I should actually come out in front, with Florian in second place. But it took a while before we were certain. And that's the way it worked out when the safety car allowed the others to overtake. The green lights were flashing for the cars in front of me. And when I came right up behind, they were still showing green, so I went past too. Half a lap later, my engineer radioed through that I was in the lead. He told me that the safety car was waiting for me at the start/finish line. So that clarified matters for us, but we had lost the benefit of the gap.

How did the situation influence the race?

For us, it was hard to maintain tyre pressure on the last lap behind the safety car because it was much slower than usual. The others, who were closing up again, were able to put their foot down, which helped them on the restart.

How hard was it to keep your opponents behind you when the other EFP by Tece car with Florian Spengler at the wheel was no longer in second place?

I was obviously sorry when Florian was no longer behind me. At first, I didn't even know what was going on. After that it was a really cool fight for the lead. Fortunately, we three Audis were able to pull away from the pursuing bunch. Sheldon van der Linde drove skilfully and fairly. It was a tough fight. The race could have gone on like that for another ten laps.

So retaining the lead was a real struggle?

Yes, because we had been carrying some damage since the start. We lost a couple of side flaps in the chaos early on. This showed up in the behaviour of the front axle, with the car understeering quite badly. But compared to the damage on many of the other cars, ours was only minor.