In the fifth race of the ADAC RAVENOL Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie, Team Scherer Sport PHX secured the overall victory. Driving the Audi R8 LMS GT3 evo II, Christopher Haase, Alexander Sims, and Ben Green crossed the finish line in first place after 28 laps. In second place was the Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 from Red Bull Team ABT, driven by Luca Engstler, Mirko Bortolotti, and Patric Niederhauser. Thomas Preining and Matt Campbell rounded out the podium, piloting Manthey’s Porsche 911 GT3 R to third place. The top five was completed by Mercedes-AMG Team RAVENOL in the Mercedes-AMG GT3 in fourth place and ROWE RACING in the BMW M4 GT3 in fifth place.

In the top qualifying session, which determined the starting grid for the second race of the ADAC 24h Nürburgring Qualifiers, the Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo26 from REALIZE KONDO RACING with Rinaldi made a statement: With a lap time of 8:10.275 minutes, Thierry Vermeulen secured pole position. The margin was historically narrow: just a single thousandth of a second separated him from the second-place BMW M4 GT3 from Gamota Racing (8:10.276 min). Starting driver Dennis Marschall initially held onto the lead after the lights went out and battled in the leading group, but fate struck mercilessly after about 40 minutes. During an overtaking maneuver coming out of Brünnchen, the Ferrari collided with a car it was lapping and ended up in the gravel trap.

In the first half of the race, the thrilling duel between Christopher Haase in the Scherer Audi and Max Verstappen in the Mercedes-AMG GT3 reignited at the front of the field, appearing to be a carbon copy of their NLS2 duel. Haase enjoyed the once again very respectful battle, but admitted that this time he struggled significantly more due to a lack of balance and oversteer in the cold conditions. Even though the action provided plenty of adrenaline at the command center, according to Steve Buschmann, team manager of Verstappen’s Winward team, Verstappen was given the clear instruction “no risk, take it easy” to avoid jeopardizing his finish. After 90 minutes, however, Verstappen, who was leading, made an unscheduled pit stop, where damage to the front splitter was discovered. “We brought the car in for safety reasons to prevent anything worse from happening, and we’re using the remainder of today’s race as a test run,” said Buschmann. This gave Lucas Auer the opportunity to gain valuable race experience in heavy traffic.

The joy among the victorious Audi team was understandably immense following the success. Christopher Haase summed up the day with satisfaction: “Of course, the feedback for the 24-hour race was the most important thing today. Finishing at the top is a nice bonus, but the focus was on working on the setup.” His teammate Ben Green added: “The car felt consistent over the entire distance. We were able to manage the lead well in the final stages.”

The final stages were particularly dramatic in the battle for the last podium spot. Thomas Preining (#911) and Fabian Schiller (#80) engaged in an intense duel that lasted for laps, with the two cars often separated by just centimeters. In the end, Preining prevailed and held on to a lead of just under three seconds across the finish line. Speaking into the microphone, Preining described the fierce battle from his perspective: “Fabian tried everything and was right next to me at times, but I was able to close the door every time. It was racing at the absolute limit, but always fair.”

In the SP 9 Pro-Am class, the Schnitzelalm Racing team secured the class victory. Kenneth Heyer, Jay Mo Härtling, and Jannes Fittje drove the Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#11) to a strong eighth place in the overall standings. In the SP 9 Am class, the BLACK FALCON Team EAE triumphed. Mustafa Mehmet Kaya, Thomas Kiefer, Gabriele Piana, and Mike Stursberg demonstrated impressive consistency in the Porsche 911 GT3 R (#5). After already shining in qualifying with a tenth-place finish, they were able to confirm this performance in the race and secure the victory in their class.

Car number 81 also delivered an impressive performance outside the pure GT3 front-runners. The BMW M3 Touring won the SP-X class and fought its way up to an outstanding seventh place overall, managing to hold its own in the standings even against numerous pure-bred GT3 cars.

Sven Markert, Edoardo Bugané, and Benjamin Albers from the Adrenalin Motorsport Team Mainhattan Wheels (winners of the BMW M240i class) as well as Oskar Sandberg and Alexander Fielenbach from Smyrlis Racing (winners of the Cup 3 class) head into a short NLS break until June as mid-season champions after five of ten races. The NLS regulations stipulate that a discard result is only counted after nine races have been completed, and two after ten races. Since the season opener could not start due to weather conditions and the fourth race on Saturday was also abandoned, the season totals eight scored races. This means there are no more discard results this year, and every result counts toward the final driver standings without deduction. Both teams have scored full points at all events so far and therefore jointly lead the standings at the midpoint of the season.

Despite all the sporting highlights, Sunday was marked by mourning for Juha Miettinen. The Finnish driver was fatally injured on Saturday in a pile-up during the start of the first race in his BMW 325i (#121). Before Sunday’s start, a deeply emotional moment of silence united the drivers, teams, and fans on the starting grid. Nürburg pastor Klaus Kohns found moving words in his address: “Perhaps this is the most important message we can take away from these days: that we belong together and are there for one another—especially in times of need.” It was a moment of deep solidarity that brought the motorsport community around the Nürburgring closer together and served as a reminder that human connection in such dark hours extends far beyond sporting competition.

The qualifiers served as the dress rehearsal for the ADAC RAVENOL 24h Nürburgring from May 14–17, where the NLS teams make up a large portion of the starting grid. The 1st ADAC Eifel Trophy will kick off the second half of the season in the ADAC RAVENOL Nürburgring Endurance Series on June 20.