Max Verstappen’s win at the Nurburgring Langstrecken-Serie (NLS) at the weekend has been nullified after it was discovered he used seven sets of tyres during the race instead of only six as permitted.
South Africa’s Jordan Pepper and teammate Dan Harper in the Rowe BMW inherited the victory.
Verstappen and teammates Dani Juncadella and Jules Gounon won in the four-hour event in the Red Bull-backed AMG GT3, Verstappen’s second competitive outing in the series after winning last year in a Ferrari.
The four-time Formula One world champion took a break from his usual top-tier racing schedule to mix it up with lower classes in the four-hour race in Germany on Saturday.
The Dutch racer was in pole position, two seconds ahead of the nearest competitor, but his efforts came to nothing after being disqualified.
The Mercedes-Benz team explained that the infraction happened in qualifying rather than in the race itself. “During qualifying in the morning, the team routinely exercised several driver and tyre changes. A mistake was made during this process, which ultimately led to the disqualification.
“The disqualification is tough to take,” Winward team principal, Christian Hohenadel, told Motorsport.com. “Unfortunately, we made an internal error that left the stewards with no choice but to exclude the winning car.”
Verstappen competed in the race as preparation for his debut in the Nurburgring 24 Hours later this year and hinted he could race in the next round of the NLS series due to cancellations of F1 races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
