Verstappen, disappointing results at the Ring in 2026 complicate qualifying: here’s why

Max Verstappen’s weekend starts (a little) uphill The latest, unfortunate outings at the Nurburgring Nordschleife put Max Verstappen and his team’s qualifying process for next weekend’s 24 Hours (a little) uphill. The Dutch driver, who will share the seat of his Mercedes-AMG GT3 with his teammates Lucas Auer, Daniel Juncadella and Jules Gounon in the Eifel marathon, has not achieved any significant results and will therefore be forced to pass through the qualifying sessions before knowing the starting position in the race: an aspect not to be underestimated, because if it is true that in such a long race qualifying always has a relative importance, it is also true that being stuck in traffic on such a demanding track and insidious is never advisable, at least for those with high ranking ambitions. Click here to add Formula Passion as your favorite source on Google Discover: you will find our content more easily! The qualifying format of the 24 Hours of Nurburgring The qualifications of the 24 Hours of Nurburgring on 16 and 17 May include an initial phase in three sessions – called Q1, Q2 and Q3 – which serve to establish the starting position of the crews of the categories lower than that (the SP9) in which Max Verstappen competes. At the end of the three preliminary sessions, used by the top teams as mere free practice sessions since there is no obligation to set a valid time to move on to the final phase, the Race Direction draws up the starting grid from 50th to the last (161st) place. However, for high-ranking teams, such as the Verstappen.com Racing team, it is mandatory to participate in Q2, scheduled at night, to obtain a pass for the race: otherwise, exclusion from the rest of the weekend is expected. Once the group has been skimmed off and the first 49 teams have been identified (some of which automatically qualified for the final phase), we move on to the actual qualifying, called Top Qualifying: this phase is scheduled for Friday and is structured into three direct elimination sessions (TQ1, TQ2 and TQ3) entirely similar to those that Max knows quite well from competing in the Formula 1 World Championship. It is in these sessions that Verstappen’s crew will have to fight from the bottom up, avoiding getting involved in a painful early elimination. However, this is not the case for the five teams considered “seeded” based on the results of the start of the NLS championship, which instead rightfully access TQ3. Max Verstappen on track since the first qualifying sessions. The team of the four-time F1 world champion in this sense does not have great results to boast: in March the crew was disqualified due to the irregular use of an extra set of tires over the weekend, while the subsequent outings saw the cancellation of the race following the tragic accident in which Juha Miettinen lost his life and the withdrawal due to technical problems from the following day’s race. The regulation also provides that those who drive in TQ1 cannot then participate in the following qualifying session, which also leaves a certain strategic uncertainty regarding Max Verstappen’s turn: is it better to have him drive immediately to avoid starting too far back, or wait for TQ3 and the fight for pole position with the obvious risk of being eliminated immediately? We just have to wait for Friday’s Top Qualifying to find out…

Automobile Magazine – F1 English News , 2026-05-12 16:00:00