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Germany's Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters series is a high-tech cross between NASCAR and traditional touring-car road racing, but it's also a four-wheeled celebration of everything it means to be German. The latter has traditionally made the series a closed club to Americans: Since the DTM launched in 1984, no stateside driver has been awarded a full-season factory contract. Twenty-eight years later, Grand-Am star and California native Joey Hand drove a season for BMW, which returned to the DTM for the first time in nearly two decades. If that weren't enough, the Bavarian brand also won the manufacturer's championship. When we interviewed Hand at the end of the season, he talked about his lack of culture shock and the German way of doing things. We also learned that he has a rating system for schnitzel. (What, you don't?)

DTM was back to my roots: A single-driver, hour-and-ten-minute sprint race, more like open-wheel-style racing. It's high-intensity. It's like F1 with a roof.

What initially caught the engineers' attention was my feedback. How a driver paints a picture to the engineers is critical–the guy that can do that better than the other guy can really make progress quickly.

Three years ago, I would not have been in the right frame of mind in life or in my career to do this, because I was a little more uptight. I wasn't open to just winging it.

The contact part I enjoyed. Contact was right in my wheelhouse. I think they had to get used to me, honestly.

The car is really sharp on the nose in low-speed corners, very reactive in the front, and then it's very, very hunkered down in the rear and very quick in fast corners.

Not everybody watches Seinfeld in Europe, I've come to find out.

It's just bits and pieces here and there that add up to that one, two, four seconds. I looked back and was like, it's so easy to get those bits and pieces if you don't lose focus for a second.

Everything I drive, I drive at two-and-ten. I just like the feel up there.

I talk a little bit fast, with a lot of California in me. After two weekends, I said something to one of my data-engineer guys, and he said, "I have no idea what you just said." And I was like, "Well, that's a good tidbit of information!" I had to learn to slow down and enunciate more.

They break down the pit like they do a lap. You get a print-out of your speed that breaks down how you got into the box, your reaction time leaving when the car drops, and your out laps. Then I still had to figure out standing starts. That's another report you get—reaction time, how you lay out the clutch. I saw probably three safety cars all year long. If you lose a second at the start, a second in the pit lane, if you drive off the track and lose two seconds, you're four seconds back. And you don't get that back unless you drive it back.

I learned quickly that I like wienerschnitzel, so I ended up just trying it in a lot of different places. I have a whole rating system now.

The cars are spec. BMW, Mercedes, Audi, they all have a spec tire, spec dampers, spec pistons and engine build, a spec gearbox, and suspension-pickup positions you can adjust front and rear. All you can do is turn the clickers.

With a new car, new drivers in some of the cars, new engineers, a new team...I thought BMW did a really brilliant job on their baseline, out-of-the-trailer setup.

As the American, there was no difference for me. I fit right in.

I think everybody works better when they're happy, when they've got a smile. I work better for sure, and I'm faster when I'm enjoying myself.

This Is A Developing Story

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