Nurburgring 24h: Mercedes sweeps front row in final qualifying
Maro Engel took pole position for the 47th edition of the Nurburgring 24 Hours after an enthralling final qualifying shootout on Friday evening, leading a Mercedes one-two.
#2 Mercedes AMG Team Black Falcon Mercedes AMG GT3: Adam Christodoulou, Maro Engel, Manuel Metzger, Dirk Müller
Alexander Trienitz
Engel, heading the Black Falcon assault on the Nordschleife, topped the session with a 8m10.910s on his second flying lap in the #2 Mercedes-AMG GT3 he shares with Adam Christodoulou, Manuel Metzger and Dirk Muller.
He was 0.137s quicker than Maximilian Gotz in the #48 HTP Mercedes, which topped Thursday night's first qualifying in the hands of Raffaele Marciello.
Last year's polesitter Laurens Vanthoor was on course to grab the Glickenhaus Trophy for the second time after he posted a 8m11.567s in his first lap in the #911 Team Manthey Porsche that led the way in second qualifying earlier on Friday.
But the Flemish driver wasn’t able to be quicker on his second try and ended up in third, six tenths quicker than compatriot Frederic Vervisch in the #4 Team Phoenix Audi.
Mathieu Jaminet took fifth in the #31 Frikadelli Porsche after he was just quicker than Yelmer Buurman, who finished in sixth in the #6 Black Falcon Mercedes.
Defending race winner Frederic Makowiecki ended up in seventh in the second of the Manthey Porsches after he was impeded by a slow zone because of an incident on track.
Luca Stolz drew the first starting position for Friday's shootout but almost spun his #3 Black Falcon Mercedes on his first flying lap before recovering to eighth place.
Jan Seyffarth ended up in ninth with the #16 GetSpeed Mercedes while Simon Trummer rounded out the top 10 in the quickest of the Ferrari 488 GT3s.
BMW failed to get any of its cars inside the top 10, with the best-placed M6 GT3 being that of Walkenhorst Motorsport driver Christian Krognes in 13th, some 4.2s off the pace.
Session results (top 10):
Pos. | # | Drivers | Car | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 2 | Adam Christodoulou Maro Engel Manuel Metzger Dirk Muller |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 8'10.910 | |
2 | 48 | Christian Hohenadel Lance David Arnold Raffaele Marciello Maximilian Gotz |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 8'11.047 | 0.137 |
3 | 911 | Earl Bamber Michael Christensen Kevin Estre Laurens Vanthoor |
Porsche 911 GT3 R (991 II) | 8'11.567 | 0.657 |
4 | 4 | Pierre Kaffer Frank Stippler Frederic Vervisch Dries Vanthoor |
Audi R8 LMS | 8'12.669 | 1.759 |
5 | 31 | Romain Dumas Matt Campbell Sven Muller Mathieu Jaminet |
Porsche 911 GT3 R (991 II) | 8'12.781 | 1.871 |
6 | 6 | Patrick Assenheimer Nico Bastian Yelmer Buurman Gabriele Piana |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 8'12.996 | 2.086 |
7 | 1 | Richard Lietz Frederic Makowiecki Patrick Pilet Nick Tandy |
Porsche 911 GT3 R (911 II) | 8'13.588 | 2.678 |
8 | 3 | Maxi Buhk Hubert Haupt Thomas Jager Luca Stolz |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 8'13.633 | 2.723 |
9 | 16 | Renger van der Zande Tristan Vautier Jan Seyffarth Kenneth Heyer |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 8'14.681 | 3.771 |
10 | 55 | Bjorn Grossmann Simon Trummer Jonathan Hirschi Alexander Prinz |
Ferrari 488 GT3 | 8'14.698 | 3.788 |
Be part of Motorsport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments