DTM 2012 - TV Guide

If you’re a UK-based fan of Germany’s DTM (Deutsche Tourenwagen-Meisterschaft) series, then you may be wondering how to catch up with the action on TV or online.

The new 2012 season brings with it a new era for DTM racing. BMW join the line up after a 20 year absence, to fight it out against bitter rivals Audi and Mercedes whilst no fewer than five British drivers battle for glory, including Gary Paffett, Suzie Wolff, Andy Priaulx, Jamie Green and F1 legend David Coulthard. Whilst new coupe-style racing cars have been introduced which are both safer and cheaper to run.

Among the more revolutionary features are identical safety structures for all cars, a better protected safety fuel tank, and a new ‘Incident Cam’ which can be used as evidence in controversial racing situations.

Furthermore, the seat – similar to formula cars – is now installed in the carbon fibre monocoque that is joined to the roll cage made of high-strength steel.

Each car is powered by a 4.0-litre V8 engine with approximately 500bhp, carrying a minimum weight of 1,100kg – including driver and helmet.

Sticky 18″ Hankook tyres keep the cars glued to the track, 300 x 18 at the front and 320 x 18 on the rear. AP supplies the regulation carbon fibre brakes for all cars, with a limit of 3 sets per front and rear wheels during the season.

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It looks like being a great spectacle, so how do you get to see it?

ITV4

ITV hold the rights to show highlights of the series, with coverage beginning on Saturday 5th May on ITV4 from 10:30am to 11:00am (Duration : 30 mins).

Future broadcast times have yet to be scheduled, so keep an eye on the ITV website.

ESPN

If you’d like to watch the tyre-smoking action LIVE in the UK, then you’ll need to subscribe to ESPN, but that doesn’t mean you should expect live coverage of every race.

Coverage begins on Sunday 29th April on ESPN (CH.442 on Sky) from 10:30pm to 12:15am (Duration : 105 mins), with the race repeated on Monday 30th April at 8:15pm. However ESPN’s live coverage doesn’t kick-in until the Brands Hatch round on 20th May.

To gain access you’ll need to subscribe on either Virgin Media, Freeview, BT Vision or Sky. It will cost £9 extra a month for Sky Sports subscribers, or £12 extra a month for other Sky subscribers.

Sky Sports

If you are already a Sky Sports subscriber, then you can watch highlights of each DTM race on Sky Sports 3 and 4, but it appears little better than ITV’s coverage, being broadcast some 7-10 days after the event.

Online coverage

If you don’t fancy forking out a minimum of £108 to watch each race in full on ESPN, then apart from the ITV4 highlights programme you’ll find additional coverage on dtm.tv and auditv.com.

In Germany, the races are broadcast on ARD, n-tv and Sport1 – you can also catch video highlights and interviews (in German) on the Sport1 Mediencenter.

ARD is a public service broadcaster (just like the BBC), funded by German licence payers, and offers a ‘Livestream’ service on its website. You can then watch the livestream by accessing through a proxy server.

How to: (5 minute task) find a German proxy server address usinging http://hidemyass.com/proxy-list/. Copy down an IP address and Port No. Then open up your browser settings (in Chrome, go to Settings > Under the hood > Network (change proxy settings) > LAN settings > click the ‘Use a proxy server..’ checkbox > then enter the IP address and Port No of your proxy server. You should now be able to view the ‘live’ broadcast.

Many thanks to Systems Engineer, Jason Patel, who has added further suggestions in the comments below, both for UK and US viewers.

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Race schedule and known TV coverage

Whilst the race calendar has been finalised, TV coverage is only confirmed for the first two races. Here’s what we know for now: