Audi Sport factory and customer teams have capped off the 2020 racing season with a record number of successes achieved amid significantly reduced race events held worldwide, a result of pandemic restrictions.
Audi Sport is the high-performance division of Audi AG. Besides its deep involvement in motorsports, Audi Sport also develops and produces the road-going RS models that lead their respective product lines in the Audi range. Included among these models are the RS 3 Sedan, RS 6 Avant, RS Q8 and R8—which are all set to arrive in the Philippines this month and early next year. Other current RS models count in the RS 4 Avant, RS 5 Coupe, RS 5 Sportback, RS 7 Sportback, TT RS Coupe, TT RS Roadster, RS Q3 and RS Q3 Sportback, a number of which will also be introduced in the country throughout 2021.
Despite the truncated 2020 motorsports season, Audi Sport customer teams still clinched 12 drivers’ championships, 22 class titles, 122 victories and 361 podium finishes in the 478 races around the world in which they competed. The results are comparable to Audi Sport customer teams’ records in the previous year’s full season of racing.
On its fourth year in the hugely popular TCR touring car series, Audi Sport customer teams using the RS 3 LMS in 2020 won titles in the world championship, European championship, and the TCR series in Germany and New Zealand.
Various Audi Sport customer teams in TCR this year competed in 219 races, winning 49 of them and taking to the podium a total of 159 times.
The other Audi Sport customer teams using the R8 LMS in the GT3 class were no less successful in their campaigns this year as they won 48 out of the 151 races they took part in. They also clinched 139 podium places. This means that Audi Sport has won nearly every third race in the international league, and scored at least one podium finish in almost every competition.
Audi Sport customer teams in the GT 3 class also secured seven drivers’ titles, including that scored with the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT in the prestigious GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup, plus eight other class championships.
In the GT 4 class, Audi Sport customer teams campaigning the R8 LMS GT4 this year surpassed their record in 2019 by winning 22 percent of the races in which they took part (last year the success rate was 18 percent). At the GT4 France series, Audi Sport Sainteloc Racing won the Pro-Am class for the third consecutive time—an historic first in this motorsport series.
Also included among other Audi Sport customer teams’ achievements this year are the drivers’ crowns won in the new Audi Sport Asia Trophy and in the Audi Sport Seyffarth R8 LMS Cup in Europe.
Meanwhile, Audi Sport’s factory involvement with the top-level DTM race series concluded with the RS 5 DTM setting numerous records. By scoring 28 victories, 95 podium finishes and a total of six drivers’, manufacturers’ and teams’ class titles, the RS 5 DTM has emerged as one of the most successful race cars in Germany’s touring car championship.
In 2019 and 2020, the RS 5 DTM won 28 of 36 races in the series, and took 95 out of 108 possible podium finishes. Added to this are 29 pole positions and 28 fastest race laps. The DTM finale of the 2020 season saw all six factory-fielded RS 5 DTM cars finishing in the top six places. This year, the RS 5 DTM allowed Audi to clinch the DTM manufacturers’ crown with six races still left in the season.
