Audi Neuburg opened in an official ceremony

Audi Sport will have a new home in the future. Some 20 kilometers west of Ingolstadt, a new facility has been completed a little less than two years following the groundbreaking ceremony. On Saturday, Audi Neuburg was opened in an official ceremony attended by the Bavarian Minister President Horst Seehofer and representatives of the local political community, as well as the members of the Audi board of management. The three race cars, Audi R18 e-tron quattro, Audi RS 5 DTM and Audi R8 LMS ultra, did some initial demo laps on the handling course. Previously, in May, the Audi driving experience launched customer operations on the 47-hectare grounds in Neuburg-Heinrichsheim. Audi Sport will be moving from Ingolstadt to the new facility before the year is out and in the first half of 2015, Audi Sport customer racing’s move to Neuburg will follow to complete the new Motorsport Competence Center.Audi duo take championship leadRené Rast and Kelvin van der Linde from Audi customer team Prosperia C. Abt Racing have retaken the ADAC GT Masters championship lead thanks to their second place at the Nürburgring during the sixth race weekend. The German-South African Audi duo started the second race from fourth on the grid and now lead the driver standings by three points after finishing on the podium.Schöffler and Mapelli defend championship leadThe German Thomas Schöffler and his Italian team mate Marco Mapelli defended their lead with second place in Sunday’s Italian GT Championship race at Le Castellet. After eight of 14 races this season, the Team Audi Sport Italia duo leads the rankings by eight points.Podium result for Audi in 12-hour raceGood weekend for the Audi customer team Absolute Racing in the Malaysia Merdeka Endurance Race at Sepang (Malaysia): after 12 exciting hours, Alexandre Imperatori, Henri Moser and Matt Solomon booked a place on the podium after finishing third overall in an Audi R8 LMS in the GT3 class. In addition, Henk Kiks, Daniel Bilski and Dario Garcia from Audi team B-Quik Racing were delighted about second place in the GTC class.Privateer Audi driver clinches class victory‘Maximilian Stein’ was delighted about victory during the fifth Spezial Tourenwagen Trophy race weekend at the Nürburgring. On Saturday he finished fourth overall and won the D1-2 class in his Audi R8 LMS.AB Sport Auto celebrates second in classThe Audi customer team AB Sport Auto scored a podium finish in the fifth race of the V de V Endurance Race Series season at the Spanish race track Aragón. The driver trio of Franck Thybaud/Thierry Proust/Michel Wegelin finished second in the GTV2 class in their Audi R8 LMS.Bike training with Timo Scheider at the Deutsche Post Speed AcademyThe Deutsche Post Speed Academy invited its five sponsorship candidates to a workshop at Lake Constance. The program featured a challenging 100-kilometer bike including two mountains with a height of 1,000 meters. Audi driver Timo Scheider accompanied the young road bike racers Marvin Dienst, Maximilian Günther, Jason Kremer, Fabian Schiller and Tim Zimmermann because he is a biking enthusiast himself. As a result, the young road bike racers not only learned how to cope with situations of stress from sports scientist and mental coach Gernot Emberger but profited from first-hand experiences which the two-time DTM Champion Scheider shared with them as well.A word from … Dr. Wolfgang UllrichAudi Neuburg was inaugurated in an official ceremony – a dream is coming true. Since when have you had this dream?Relatively soon after I started as Head of Motorsport at Audi 21 years ago, discussions about a center of our own began. The former supermarket we were located in was always just intended to be a provisional facility. The aim was to find a location in Ingolstadt and to be close to Technical Development (TE). But Audi kept growing during this time. As a result, it became increasingly difficult to find facilities in Ingolstadt. When the opportunity in Neuburg arose, we realized that it provided many advantages and accepted that we wouldn’t be in immediate proximity to TE. However, we’ll obviously continue to be closely associated with TE in organizational and technological respects. What new opportunities are opening up for Audi Sport due to the new complex?We now have adequate grounds and perfect facilities to set ourselves up. Personnel can now be accommodated in accordance with our operational processes – that wasn’t always the case in the past. In the future, various functions that are distributed to Audi Sport and individual TE departments today will be concentrated at a single complex here in Neuburg an der Donau. The fact that we now have a track for initial functional tests of our race cars directly on our doorstep is another advantage.You’re planning to move with your team in October. The sport program is continuing in parallel to the move. In the DTM, three more rounds are on the agenda, and the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) is starting its overseas season. What are your aims?In the DTM, we’re aiming to decide the manufacturers’ and the teams’ classifications in our favor. And we finally want to celebrate our first victory of the Audi RS 5 DTM this season. In the WEC, following the 13th victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours, we’re in a good position. In the remaining five WEC rounds, we’re set on trying everything to defend our titles again in the third consecutive year.Coming up next week

06.09 Dijon (F), DMV Touring Car Challenge, round 607.09 Algarve (P), Blancpain Sprint Series, round 507.09 Magny-Cours (F), French GT Championship, round 507.09 Spa (B), Belgian GT Championship, round 507.09 Spa (B), GT Open, round 607.09 Okayama (J), Super Taikyu Series, round 407.09 Lohéac (F), Rallycross World Championship, round 807.09 Barcelona (E), 24-hour race