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Nurburgring 24h: Mercedes claims historic 1-2-3-4

Mercedes AMG customer teams claimed a commanding 1-2-3-4 in the 2016 Nurburgring 24-Hour race at the infamous Nordschleife that saw the closest ever finish of all 44 editions so far, too.

1st place #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger

1st place #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger

James Holland

Race winners: #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger
Checkerd flag for #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger
Race winners: #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger
Podium: 1st place #4 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Bernd Schneider, Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger, 2nd place #29 AMG-Team HTP Motorsport, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Christian Vietoris, Marco Seefried, Christian Hohenadel, Renger Van der Zande, 3rd place #88 Haribo Racing Team-AMG, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Uwe Alzen, Lance David Arnold; Maximilian Götz, Jan Seyffarth
#29 AMG-Team HTP Motorsport, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Christian Vietoris, Marco Seefried, Christian Hohenadel, Renger Van der Zande
#29 AMG-Team HTP Motorsport, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Christian Vietoris, Marco Seefried, Christian Hohenadel, Renger Van der Zande
#9 AMG-Team Black Falcon, Mercedes-AMG GT3: Hubert Haupt, Yelmer Buurman, Maro Engel, Dirk Müller

After 24 hours and a total of 134 laps around the 25km combination of Grand Prix circuit and Nordschleife the difference between first and second was a mere 5.7 seconds.

However, it was not the small gap between Maro Engel in the #4 Black Falcon Mercedes AMG GT3 and Christian Hohenadel in the #29 HTP Motorsport sister car on the finish line that left people gasp in shock, but the last-lap dare-devil move Engel pulled to make his way past Hohenadel to claim P1 and, eventually, the overall victory, too.

“It’s a pity for Christian to lose the win on the last lap,” said Engel. And Hohenadel echoed these thoughts: “It’s a very bitter end to this race. Definitely not a nice experience.”

But it will not stop there as Hohenadel’s team HTP Motorsport already lodged a protest against Engel’s move to try and see whether the stewards would reconsider the situation.

Immediately after the finish, however, 24h race director Walter Hornung had declared that he didn’t see the need for an investigation into the matter.

On track, Black Falcon’s #9 car and Haribo Racing’s #88 Mercedes AMG GT3 completed the 1-2-3-4 of the German brand with the #23 Schubert-BMW finishing fifth and best of the rest in front of another Mercedes, the #75 Zakspeed machine.

Bentley, Audi and Porsche also managed to bring home top 10 results but overall didn’t stand a chance against Mercedes.

The Mercedes cars had taken control of the race early on, and even though the lead changed several times during the 24 hours were always up front. On the other hand Audi, BMW and Porsche all lost their best placed cars due to accidents or technical problems which helped Mercedes to shine even more.

Engel shares the winner’s glory with Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger and DTM hero Bernd Schneider.

Race results (top 10):

Pos.No.DriversCarLapsTime/Gap
4  Bernd Schneider
 Maro Engel
 Adam Christodoulou
 Manuel Metzger
Mercedes 134 24:07'46.500
29  Christian Vietoris
 Marco Seefried
 Christian Hohenadel
 Renger van der Zande
Mercedes 134 +5.697
88  Uwe Alzen
 Lance David Arnold
 Maximilian Gotz
 Jan Seyffarth
Mercedes 133 1 Lap
9  Hubert Haupt
 Yelmer Buurman
 Maro Engel
 Dirk Muller
Mercedes 133 1 Lap
23  Alexander Sims
 Philipp Eng
 Maxime Martin
 Dirk Werner
BMW 133 1 Lap
75  Kenneth Heyer
 Sebastian Asch
 Luca Ludwig
 Daniel Keilwitz
Mercedes 131 3 Laps
38  Christopher Bruck
 Christian Menzel
 Guy Smith
 Fabian Hamprecht
Bentley 131 3 Laps
2  Stuart Leonard
 Robin Frijns
 Edward Sandstrom
 Frederic Vervisch
Audi 130 4 Laps
44  Peter Dumbreck
 Wolf Henzler
 Martin Ragginger
 Alexandre Imperatori
Porsche 130 4 Laps
10  16  Marc Busch
 Dennis Busch
 Christian Mamerow
 Rene Rast
Audi 130 4 Laps

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