July 31, 2009
Mattias Ekstrom has been docked a place in the results from the DTM race at Zandvoort after Audi were found to have breached the series' ban on team orders. Ekstrom finished the race at the Dutch track in second place after making up a deficit of more than five seconds to the 2008-spec Audis of Oliver Jarvis and Alexandre Premat in just a handful of laps towards the end of the race, but he has been handed a five-second penalty, which drops him to third behind Jarvis. The manner in which he caught and passed the Phoenix team's drivers sparked an investigation by the German motorsport authority, with the decision being that Audi had breached Article 20.2 of the DTM sporting regulations, which states: "Team orders which interfere with the race result are prohibited." Further discussions between the officials and Audi team members took place at Oschersleben on Friday, before the decision to penalise Ekstrom, and fine both the Abt Sportline and Team Phoenix squads was confirmed in the afternoon