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On his GT3 debut, Max Verstappen won the ninth round of the Nurburgring Langstrecken-Serie on the iconic Nordschleife.
Having qualified third, Verstappen was in the lead by the first corner.
Posting the quickest time of the day on Lap 4, after 14 laps, having already pitted once, the Dutchman handed over the Red Bull-liveried Ferrari 296 GT3, run by Swiss outfit Emil Frey Racing, to teammate Chris Lulham, the Briton rejoining the race still leading the Ford Mustang GT3 of Frank Stippler and the Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 EVO of Christian Kroges.
The final hour saw numerous incidents, with a Code 60 – effectively a VSC – cutting Lulham’s lead to 40s.
Following his final stop a further Code 60 reduced his lead over the Mustang to 24s but the Briton went on to take the flag, scoring a debut win for himself and his teammate.
“It was great!”, Verstappen told his personal website. “During my first two stints, the car was amazing. After qualifying, I knew the car would be good on a dry track.
“Everything went well in terms of traffic, and we didn’t make any big mistakes. To win my debut race here is amazing.”
“Of course, we really want to race the 24-hour race, here at the Nordschleife,” he admitted. “If that’s going to be next year, I don’t know yet. Of course we need more experience, so hopefully we can enter a few more NLS races next year.”
“The car was amazing,” added Lulham. “There was a lot of traffic and several accidents and ‘code 60’ situations, which didn’t make it easy for me.
“I’m so happy,” he added. “I’ve got to thank Verstappen.com Racing and Emil Frey Racing for offering me this package to make such a strong NLS debut.”
Picture Credit: Max Verstappen / X
