Porsche romped to a DTM championship treble in solely its second season within the class final yr, because it swept the drivers, groups and the producers’ titles with Thomas Preining and the Manthey EMA staff.
The feat was significantly spectacular as Porsche confronted all three of its fundamental German rivals, Audi, BMW and Mercedes, plus Italian supercar producers Ferrari and Lamborghini, in a six-way struggle for glory.
The outcome additionally marked a profitable begin to Manthey EMA’s foray into the DTM, having joined the ADAC-run class in the beginning of 2023 to interchange SSR Performance as Porsche’s major staff.
However Manthey founder and advisor Olaf Manthey doesn’t assume a repeat of its 2023 success is feasible this yr, as he hinted politics might play a task in figuring out the end result of the championship.
“I do not assume we’ll be allowed to do it once more,” the 69-year-old informed Autosport’s sister title Motorsport-Whole.com. “It all the time must be nicely combined.
“That is the thought of the BoP [Balance of Performance], to deliver the totally different makes collectively so that you’ve got a superb sporting present the place everybody can participate and that is the suitable factor to do.
“Nevertheless, we have now to look at how issues develop over the course of the yr. After which we’ll must see the place we find yourself.”
Final yr, Porsche was represented by a complete of six vehicles within the DTM, as Manthey EMA, Staff Bernhard and Toksport WRT all entered a pair of 911 GT3 Rs for a mixture of manufacturing facility and non-factory drivers.
Nevertheless, following Toksport WRT’s withdrawal and Staff Bernhard’s resolution to focus solely on one-make championships, Manthey EMA is left as the only real Porsche staff within the 2024 DTM season.
Meaning there will likely be simply two vehicles from Stuttgart model this yr, one for defending champion Preining and the opposite for Ayhancan Guven, who has moved throughout from Staff Benhard to interchange Ford-bound Dennis Olsen.
Requested if Porsche faces a political drawback by having just one staff and two vehicles within the class, Manthey mentioned: “A number of different producers have a number of extra vehicles within the championship.
“And as it’s the similar in different championships with BoPs, I imagine that you just need to combine it up nicely and that everybody has a flip [at winning].”
Manthey’s feedback comply with repeated allegations that Porsche acquired a beneficial BoP within the DTM final yr, particularly on the Hockenheim finale the place Preining received each races to seal the title.
Specifically, former Formulation 1 and DTM driver Ralf Schumacher, whose son David raced for Winward Mercedes final yr, claimed Porsche was “higher off than it ought to have been” within the title decider.
However the Manthey founder refuted these allegations, saying: “Perhaps you must go into the lap time evaluation, what we drove at what time and what the others drove at what time.
“Then you may come to a standard denominator comparatively rapidly and might’t really make such statements when you use your head, as a result of I do not actually assume it is smart to only toss stuff into the room like that.”