Thomas Preining had already marked himself out as a future champion during his rookie DTM season in 2022 with the single-car Team Bernhard operation. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that he delivered on that promise in his sophomore campaign this year after being given a plum seat at the Manthey EMA squad.
While his pace in the Porsche 911 GT3-R was obvious, his consistency ultimately won him the title: he finished all 16 races inside the points, including 11 in the top five. A double victory at the Hockenheim finale, against an in-form Mirko Bortolotti, proved beyond any doubt that the 25-year-old Austrian was a deserving winner.
The 33-point winning margin for Preining doesn’t quite encapsulate the intensity of the 2023 season, as the championship battle swung back and forth between him and his SSR Lamborghini counterpart Bortolotti. But while Bortolotti’s results fluctuated throughout the year, Preining was always there or thereabouts, as he led Porsche to an incredible title treble in only its second full season in the category.
The Austrian was up to speed from the outset and would have been victorious in the second race at Oschersleben had his Manthey EMA team not been penalised for briefly leaving a tyre in the pitlane. The bizarre rule was changed before the following round at Zandvoort, where Preining bagged another podium finish to take the points lead. But it was at the Norisring where he really shone.
Source: Autosport