Audi are looking to break a six-year hoodoo in the race every driver wants to win as DTM heads to Nuremberg for the fifth round of the season at the Norisring.
The high-speed circuit is widely considered to be the jewel in the DTM crown, but it is an event the Ingolstadt marque has not won since 2002 when Laurent Aiello took victory with the TT Coupe.
As such, the A4 DTM, which is widely considered to place its emphasis on handling rather than speed, is yet to star around the much anticipated street course, with Christian Abt scoring its best result of second place in 2005.
Nonetheless, Audi head to the Norisring with plenty of confidence after a stellar start to the season with the latest evolution A4, one that has delivered two victories in four races and a championship lead for Timo Scheider.
As the best of the four works drivers, Scheider is excited about the prospect of racing at the Norisring, not least because he has shed much of the success ballast that hampered his progress last time out at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz.
"It's great that we can take out another ten kilograms handicap ballast after the race on the EuroSpeedway and we are now equal with the 2008 Mercedes. This means that the we all start from scratch again. Nuremburg has traditionally been a tough nut to crack for us. However, we've worked hard to do a good job there and to give the employees and guests of Audi a good show."
Scheider's sentiment is shared by Tom Kristensen, who points out that the Audi is performing better now on circuits once considered to be their weakness. Given the Dane is fresh from his eighth Le Mans triumph in the under-performing R10 TDI, he is probably best to argue the case that anything can happen.
"I'm looking forward to the Norisring. This year Audi Sport has built a car with which we are better on exactly those circuits where we were traditionally weak. The Norisring was certainly a weak point up to now. I think that it'll be very close between Audi and Mercedes this year. This boosts our motivation. This race is the DTM race which everybody wants to win – it's Germany's Monaco."
![Timo Scheider - Audi Sport Team Abt [pic credit: Audi Motorsport]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/431151.jpg)
