15.10.2006

Bernd Schneider shows his skills again

In the penultimate season round of the 2006 DTM season at Le Mans in France, 42-year old Bernd Schneider already secured himself the title. After his successes in 1995, 2000, 2001 and 2003, this is Schneider’s fifth title win in the most popular international touring car series. Like Michael Schumacher in Formula 1, Bernd Schneider has almost every record in the DTM: with 41 race wins, 24 pole-positions and 60 fastest race laps so far, the Mercedes-Benz works driver is by far the most successful driver in the history of the DTM.

After Bernd Schneider had been fourth in the final standings of the 2005 season and the title went to his only 24-year old Mercedes-Benz team-mate Gary Paffett, the chance of the guard between the young and the elder generation in the DTM appeared to be completed. But Schneider struck back and proved his critics to be wrong. “I always knew what I can do and I didn’t get nervous. There is a high after every low, that is what motor racing is like”, the 42-year old explains his success. In the process, his consistency was once more the secret of his success. Two victories in the first two rounds of the season at the Hockenheimring and the EuroSpeedway Lausitz were followed by one third and four second places. Only after the third and the ninth season round, Schneider wasn’t on the podium. At Oschersleben, he crossed the finish line in fifth place and at Le Mans, he did likewise. There, however, fifth place was enough for him to already claim the title with one race to go.

Another proof: from all the 23 drivers that have been racing in the DTM so far this year, Schneider was the only one to score championship points in every round. Even when things weren’t going his way in qualifying, Schneider remained his calm and focussed on the essential thing: the race. For instance, he started seventh on the grid for the seventh season round at Zandvoort and still claimed eight valuable points by finishing the race in second place. “Like in almost every sport, it is the eventual result that counts. Age also means experience and in situations like that, this is helpful”, says Schneider. He is relieved: “Finally, I have done it again.” In the past two years, things weren’t running well for the driver who comes from the German province of Saarland. With only one victory, he finished sixth in the championship in 2004, last year he also scored only one win. In the years before since 1992, he had always won at least two races. “Then, some people already said that I wasn’t eager anymore, that I am getting too old”, Schneider recalls. “But fortunately, especially at Mercedes-Benz, there have always been people who had faith in me and remained loyal to me.”

Privately, things are going well for Schneider, too. Together with his partner Svenja and their daughter Lilly-Sophie, who was born in spring 2005, he is living in Monte Carlo. However, the trained structural engineer doesn’t have too much time for his hobbies golf, squash, billiard and table tennis, as he spends most of his time for his favourite occupation: “The thing I prefer most is driving race cars”, says Schneider. And he is quite successfully in doing so...