Nürburgring 24 Hours Top Qualifying report: Raffaele Marciello leads all-Mercedes front row with new lap record

Raffaele Marciello broke the lap record in Top Qualifying to score pole position for the 51st edition of the ADAC TotalEnergies 24h Nürburgring. The Swiss was the quickest aboard his #4 Mercedes-AMG Team Bilstein Mercedes-AMG GT3 clocking an 8m09.058sec in the first of the two-lap shoot-out.

Three-time pole winner Maro Engel initially held the fastest lap until the last in the group of qualifiers, Marciello, crossed the line just 0.422sec faster than the #3 Mercedes-AMG Team GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG GT3. No-one was able to improve on Marciello’s opening lap, leaving the Haupt Racing Team-run #4 Mercedes-AMG to start the endurance classic from pole.

The biggest mover after lap two was Kelvin van der Linde. Piloting the #27 Abt Sportsline Lamborghini Huracán GT3, the South African jumped up the grid and bumped the #30 Frikadelli Racing Team Ferrari 296 GT3 of Nick Catsburg down to fourth.

In the first Top Qualifying session, Christian Krognes had a big accident in Hatzenbach as he lost control and smacked into the tyre barriers. This ripped open the side of the #101 Walkenhorst Motorsport BMW M4 GT3, however, the Norwegian got out unharmed.

With the number of laps in Top Qualifying 1 reduced to just one, the session saw more drama as Kévin Estre was unable to bring the #911 Manthey Racing Porsche 992 GT3R into the second session where pole position was on the line, leaving the Porsche team to start from a lowly 20th place.

The 24 Hours of the Nürburgring goes green Saturday at 16:00 CEST. Watch the race from start to finish on GT.REPORT/live.