Dunlop Motorsport lead Porsche 1-2 in NLS 10
With only two wins in the Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie (NLS) this year, compared to five last year, Porsche might have felt they had unfinished business. The Stuttgart manufacturer will be relieved that they finished the final round in first and second, led by the rookie-team: Dunlop.
At 11:00 the No.23 Gamota Racing BMW took the green flag first having taken pole position by two seconds. The BMW kept the lead in turn one while the No.44 Falken Motorsport Porsche and No.26 PROsport Mercedes battled it out for second place behind. The Mercedes had to catch a snap of oversteer exiting the Mercedes Arena and fell behind the No.36 Gamota Racing BMW.
The No.17 Dunlop Porsche was immediately making positions, overtaking the BMW for third place. Behind, the No.75 Max Kruse Audi was making even better progress, overtaking the cars ahead to be second place by the end of the first lap.
Although the Audi was unable to overtake the leader, it trailed the No.23 BMW for all of the first stint. Eventually the lead changed, but the Audi pit immediately after.
Due to the minimum pit time regulations, the Audi was given a gap to the BMW, who pit a lap later, but the Audi had to suffer through a longer pit stop later in the race.
A few cars had pit before both the leaders, including the No.17 Porsche which inherited first place. Nearing the mid point of the race, the pace started coming to the two Porsches. The No.44 pushed its way past the No.75 Audi to become the leader of the cars which took a long first stint.
90 minutes into the race, the Falken Motorsport car's overall position was fourth, two cars behind its sister. The No.26 PROsport Mercedes was in second and the No.77 Schubert Motorsport BMW was third, from 16th on the grid. A few minutes earlier the Mercedes was fifth, but Adam Christdoloulou executed an excellent three car overtake on the Döttinger Höhe.
A lap later the Schubert Motorsport BMW re-overtook Christdoloulou and the Mercedes suffered damage in the process that dropped the car down the order. The No.26 pit for repairs, but his bonnet popped open on the out lap. The No.75 Audi's opportunity to recover its earlier lead was lost when it received a drive-through penalty for a yellow flag infringement.
A Porsche one-three turned into a Porsche one-two after the second round of pit stops when the No.44 Porsche jumped ahead of the No.77 BMW. At this point the No.17 Porsche was uncatchable, with a 37 second lead.
Sven Müller bought the Dunlop Porsche across the line as the winner, shared with his teammate Nico Menzel. The Falken Motorsport Porsche retained second, and confirmed a one-two finish for most successful manufacturer in the series' history.
The No.77 Schubert Motorsport BMW finished in third, a minute behind the other German cars.
The No.75 Max Kruse Audi finished fourth, the winner of the alternate fuel class. The team will regret earlier's drive-through as they would have finished on the podium without it.
The top five was completed by the No.48 48 LOSCH Motorsport Porsche, which also won the SP9 Pro-AM class. Sixth and seventh overall also completed the Pro-Am podium, the No.23 Gamota Racing BMW and No.26 PROsport Mercedes.
The first non-SP9 car finished Eighth. The No.900 Black Falcon Porsche won the Cup 2 class, half a minute ahead of the No.904 which just missed out on an overall top tenth.
This was Dunlop Motorsport's second win of the season, which exceeds their expectations from the start of the year as first-timers. The only other repeat winner in 2026 was Schubert Motorsport; coincidentally both teams were rookies to the class at the beginning of the season.
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