All three drivers will race for the expanded Schubert Motorsport team, a departure from BMW’s previous philosophy of splitting its DTM attack across two separate outfits.
BMW reasoned that by consolidating its entire line-up in a single team it will be able to pool its strengths and “create optimal conditions” to fight for the title again.
Van der Linde and Rast were both part of Schubert’s driver crew last year, while Wittmann has moved across from the now-defunct Project 1 outfit to create a larger three-car team.
Two-time champion Wittmann had long called for “equal conditions” across BMW’s DTM camp, having felt that he didn’t get as many opportunities to test the car outside of race weekends as fellow champions van der Linde and Rast.
Schubert is one of the top GT3 teams in the DTM and has conducted an extensive number of private tests since it first joined the series in 2022.
In fact, a comprehensive testing programme with the then-new BMW M4 GT3 was a key to the team scoring the title in its debut season with van der Linde.
Source: Autosport