Ravenol Mercedes top hail affected N24 Qualifying 1

Credit: Luna Maas

It's time to get the racing action underway for the 2026 Nürburgring 24 Hours. At 13:15 local time the light at the end of the pit lane for the first session of the weekend.

The No.80 Ravenol Mercedes of Fabian Schiller topped the timing sheets with an 8:14.9 around the track.

Session Results - Overall Top 10

1st No.80 Mercedes-AMG Team Ravenol - 8:14.9

2nd No.1 ROWE Racing BMW - +3.1s

3rd No.3 Verstappen.com Winward Racing Mercedes - +3.5s

4th No.99 ROWE Racing BMW - +3.6s

5th No.911 Manthey Racing Porsche - +6.7s

6th No.130 Red Bull Team ABT Lamborghini - +7.0s

7th No.77 Schubert Motorsport BMW - +11.6s

8th No.64 HRT Ford - +11.7s

9th No.16 Scherer Sport PHX Audi - +12.1s

10th No.17 Dunlop Motorsports Porsche - +12.2s

As it happened

161 cars and 20 classes took to the track immediately for this half qualifying-half practice session. While that might seem confusing, well.... it actually is. That is no problem though, as DIVEBOMB's Sharifah Zaqreeztrina put together a qualifying explainer this morning. Read it here.

However, for this session all you need to know is; it's essentially a practice session for the SP9 (GT3), SP11, SP-Pro, and SP-X classes, as their grid positions would be decided in Top Qualifying 1, 2 and 3 tomorrow.

The two hour session would be important for the rest of the classes though. Their qualifying positions on the 161 car grid would be decided by their best time from this session (Q1), Qualifying 2 (20:00 local time tonight) and Qualifying 3 (midday tomorrow).

So the overall positions at the end of this session didn't matter too much, but it was important to get some good laps in and get the drivers up to speed ahead of the proper nail biter sessions.

An interesting quirk about this session, and the rest of them this weekend (barring the race itself) there are a set of cones on the main straight. This is due to the long nature of the track, so there is a 'shortcut' at the end of the GP loop to aid the drivers and teams.

The drivers can turn right at the end of the GP loop instead of left onto the Nordschlife, either return to the pits or come back onto the main straight, to start a flying lap much sooner. Ignoring the need to do a full 8-10 minute out lap.

With 161 cars on the track, the action and issues came very quick and very fast. The No.821 SP3 T Sharky Racing Audi RS3 had a very brief spin exiting the second corner, but they got it looped back around and moving on it's way again.

Then the No.520 Toyo Tires Toyota Supra with an all Japanese line-up stopped on the side of the GP loop with a mechanical issue, meanwhile the No.7 Konrad SP9 Lamborghini had steam pouring out of the engine bay. That car did get back out on track, having a spin on the exit of the first corner.

No.7 Konrad Motorsport Lamborghini in NLS 3 I Credit: Luna Maas

However, the first Code 60 was caused by the No.24 Lionspeed GP Porsche SP9. Ricardo Feller crashed on the early part of the Nordschlife. The car had to be towed back on the back of a flatbed.

The first big accident was for the No.900 Black Falcon Cup 2 car. Alexander Hardt had stopped on the side of the GP loop with what looked to be an overheating engine. He was standing at the side of the car, attempting to signal fire marshalls over to his car.

But a Code 60 hadn't been called yet and the No.146 Giti Tire AT2 Porsche came around, unsighted, and collided with the stricken car. Hardt was quite lucky not to be hit by the car or a stray piece of debris. Both driver were okay after the incident thankfully, but both cars sustained quite heavy damaged.

The No.67 Ford Mustang had a mechanical issue at Schwedenkreuz with Christopher Mies at the wheel. The camo liveried HRT car seemed to have spilled a good bit of fluid onto the track, as he pulled into the service road. Marshalls were however quick to clear it up with some quick dry powder.

Despite the multiple seconds to set the grid, it was still important to minimise mistakes. The No.440 and No.505 cars found this out the hard way, getting a 30 second penalty each to be served at the end of lap 1 of the race on Saturday. Both were punished for speeding in a yellow flagged area.

Similarly the No.10 SP3 T VW Golf got sent to the back of it's starting group for not respecting the Code 60 rules.

Due to all of the incidents causing various Code 60s around the track and a couple of damp patches of road on the Nordschlife, the lap times in the first hour or so were around the 8:40s.

The Code 60s soon subsided though and the track conditions improved. Halfway through the session Max Verstappen topped the time sheets with an 8:18.5, eight seconds quicker than the No.1 and No.99 ROWE BMWs at that time.

That was just a brief period though, the yellows were back out very soon. It wasn't for another half an hour until the track was fully green again, and the purple and green sectors came flying in once again.

Fabian Schiller in the No.80 Ravenol Mercedes AMG went to the top with a 8:14.9, followed by Raffaele Marciello three seconds slower, but four tenths quicker than Verstappen's previous best time.

The rain arrived then though, and it arrived hard about a third of the way around the lap. But then shots cut to the final sectors of the lap and the sun was shining. A prime example of the mini climate that the Nürburgring has.

That rain turned to hail and quickly engulfed most of the circuit, that was pretty much it in terms of setting better lap times. Conditions could turn out like this in the race though, so it was still valuable mileage for the teams.

Qualifying 2 will get underway at 20:00 tonight (19:00 BST) with three and a half hours of running lined up into the darkness.