Red Bull driver takes first place

Max Verstappen took pole position in the NLS2 race at the Nürburgring Nordschleife on Saturday 21 March, producing a dominant qualifying performance. The Red Bull driver topped the session in the No. 3 Mercedes-AMG GT3, continuing his relatively new journey in endurance racing.

Verstappen will compete in the second event of the 2026 Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie as part of his preparations for the Nürburgring 24 Hours later this year in May. The Dutchman leads his own Verstappen Racing team, where he drives a Mercedes-AMG GT3.

For this event and the Nurburgring 24h, Verstappen will share driving duties with a team made up of Lucas Auer, Jules Gounon and Daniel Juncadella.

On Saturday, qualifying saw Verstappen emerge as the benchmark as he claimed pole with a time of 7:49.578 seconds across the 20.8km combined layout. The result was 1.9 seconds faster than Christopher Haas, who put the No. 16 Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II into second place in Sunday’s race.

Verstappen said, reflecting on the performance immediately after his result [via Motorsport.com]:

“You always need a little bit of luck with traffic. I think this was the only lap of the day where the 60 code didn’t slow me down. I feel AMG is connected, but honestly, today is a glorious test session for us. I still need to get the muscle memory back for driver changes at pit stops. We don’t quite do that in Formula 1.”

Max Verstappen’s first endurance ride of 2026 was much better than his start to the 2026 F1 season. The 4x world champion crashed in qualifying during the opening round of the season in Australia, and was forced to withdraw from the second race in China.

The Dutch driver has also been vocal about not enjoying the 2026 Formula 1 regulations, and has stated that his focus on endurance racing is currently acting as a “positive distraction” away from F1.

Helmut Marko reveals he rejected Max Verstappen’s outrageous Nürburgring request

Former Red Bull team advisor Helmut Marko has revealed that he “prevented” Max Verstappen from testing at the Nürburgring in a Red Bull Formula 1 car. Marko explained that Verstappen wanted to break Timo Bernhard’s record, which he set in the Le Mans car.

Marco said speaking about the idea [via F1-insider]:

“Years ago, Max excitedly told me about the Nordschleife. He wanted to do a test ride in a Red Bull Formula 1 car. But for me, all the alarm bells went off at that time. There was no question of doing a test ride! Max had seen the crazy video of Timo Bernhard breaking the Le Mans record with Porsche.

“I think he wanted to overcome that again with Red Bull. It was very dangerous for me. That’s why I stopped him and banned him.”

Helmut Marko also added that he is happy that Max Verstappen is now able to enjoy driving at the Nürburgring through his endurance racing programme. But he still reiterates that the 28-year-old still has Timo Bernhard’s record on his mind, in his opinion.