Nürburgring 24 Hours: Max Verstappen’s team clear warm-up milestone
The #3 Mercedes co-driven by Max Verstappen in action
Max Verstappen’s team reached an important milestone at the Nürburgring 24 Hours by completing the warm-up event without issue.
A session designed to debug and fine tune the cars ahead of the 24-hour race start, Joules Gounon took the wheel of the #3 Verstappen Racing Mercedes, and delivered a smooth session to a P9 result.
Max Verstappen’s team up and running on race day
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Before the Nürburgring 24 Hours, the field had a one-hour warm-up session to navigate.
Rather than a session where drivers were chasing an eye-catching time, the warm-up was more a case of system checking the car and confirming setup before the main event.
Jules Gounon was at the wheel of the #3 Verstappen Racing Mercedes.
Drivers were getting a little taste of the wet weather expected for the Nürburgring 24 Hours, with drops of rain falling around the Nordschleife.
At the halfway stage, the #911 Porsche was atop the leaderboard with a 8:42.238 delivered by Kévin Estre.
The #3 Mercedes was P4, but, of course, representative times were not yet the aim of the game.
The repaired #80 Mercedes – after Maro Engel’s rare off on Friday – went P1 as we entered the final five minutes of the session, as some faster times began to arrive.
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Manned by Maxime Martin, the #80 Mercedes clocked a 8:32.206, taking over as the new benchmark, 4.5 seconds up on the #26 Mercedes.
That time stood firm to secure P1 for the #80 Mercedes.
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