Rast and the ill-fated Spitzkehre

The crash at Hockenheim and a painful echo

Rene Rast lost a possible fourth title at the recent DTM final in Hockenheim after he got involved in a chain reaction in the Spitzkehre on the first lap. That corner seems to keep turning against him: the same spot also cost him a championship early in his career.

At Hockenheim, Rast came out of the first lap as a casualty, his car too badly damaged to continue driving. With that, his championship chances evaporated in one fell swoop.

What exactly happened in 2006

In 2006, Rast raced in the Seat Leon Cup and started the final race weekend as championship leader, from the front row, on a drying track. As in Hockenheim later, things went wrong on the first lap: defending champion Thomas Marschall hit Erik Janis, causing Janis to collide with Rast again. Rast had to abandon the race as his car was too badly damaged.

The race organisers pointed to Erik Janis as the culprit and awarded him a penalty. Florian Gruber, who came to the final third in the championship, took advantage and took the championship with a satisfactory result. Rast finished second that season, with three wins, and eventually missed out on the title by just three points.

• Season: 2006, Seat Leon Cup - title loss due to incident in Spitzkehre
• Drivers involved: Rene Rast, Thomas Marschall, Erik Janis, Florian Gruber
• Results: Janis penalised as perpetrator; Gruber benefited
• Rast: three season victories, finishes two points short of the lead

Setback finally led to breakthrough

After that disappointment, Rast picked up where he left off. In 2007, he switched to the Porsche Carrera Cup Deutschland. A year later, he won the title in that series. Between 2010 and 2012, he made a name for himself in the Porsche Supercup with three titles in a row.

Despite his success in Porsche, Rast also had setbacks: BMW and Audi did not initially see him as a DTM contender. It was only in 2016 that he made his DTM debut at Zandvoort due to an injury to Adrien Tambay, and a year later he took his first DTM title in his rookie year.

The parallel between 2006 and the recent Hockenheim incident shows how one turn in one lap can change careers. For Rast, it ultimately remained a path with deep setbacks, but also with a strong comeback and later great success.