Solely 20 automobiles are entered for the total 2024 DTM season, marking the fewest entries seen within the championship because it first switched to GT3 laws in 2021.
Excessive working prices, lowered producer help and financial situations at giant have been cited as key causes behind the decline in participation from final yr, when 28 drivers took half within the sequence.
Nonetheless, 17 drivers from 2023 are persevering with within the DTM this yr, together with big-name tickets like Marco Wittmann, Rene Rast, Lucas Auer, Maro Engel and newly-crowned champion Thomas Preining.
Additionally returning to the class is Le Mans 24 Hours class winner Nicki Thiim, who will probably be competing with the SSR Performance Lamborghini staff this yr after an ill-fated debut with T3 Motorsport in 2022.
Van der Linde, now one of many 4 former title winners on the grid, feels there is no such thing as a purpose to be involved concerning the grid being downsized by a 3rd this season, as no prime drivers have dropped off the sequence.
“I feel we’ve misplaced 10 automobiles however I don’t assume we’ve misplaced any high quality,” the South African advised Motorsport.com/Autosport.
“All the large names are there, and that’s clearly essential for a championship like DTM to maintain having guys like Rene and Marco, ex-champions, which retains the title of DTM on the next degree.
“If you happen to’re competing in opposition to the very best drivers, that mechanically places the championship on a excessive degree.”
The DTM has witnessed quite a few dramatic crashes in its GT3 period, with the 2022 occasion at Hockenheim coming to thoughts as an occasion that was dominated by main accidents. Such was the extent of harm from the carnage that six drivers have been pressured to overlook the ultimate race of the yr, with David Schumacher additionally sustaining a fracture to his lumbar vertebra.
Even final yr, because the ADAC went again on the controversial standing restarts rule that was launched by earlier proprietor ITR, the DTM didn’t precisely have a season freed from main incidents.
Most notably, two separate pile-ups introduced out the purple flag within the second race on the Sachsenring, with quite a few automobiles left with an excessive amount of injury to take the restart.
Van der Linde, who was himself concerned in one of many two incidents, feels a smaller grid will mechanically cut back the probabilities of first-lap wrecks.
“I don’t see it as much less automobiles, I really see it as constructive within the sense that there’s much less carnage on the beginning as a result of final yr typically it was fairly ridiculous with all of the accidents that occurred,” he defined.
“Simply because there’s too many automobiles, persons are making an attempt to make positions on the beginning as a result of they know that’s the one time which you can actually achieve something out of the race.
“As a result of ultimately, it’s troublesome to move a GT3 automobile. In that sense it’s going to be extra right down to qualifying now, much less visitors, which suggests the laps are extra honest, you don’t get blocked or something the place a man that ought to be on the entrance begins on the again for instance.
“I feel it’s simply extra honest and also you’ll see a real one on the finish.”