Nürburgring 24 Resumes After Four-Hour Delay

After a four-hour stoppage, the Nürburgring 24 restarted at 8:04 p.m. local time, with 19 hours of the race remaining.

Following three full laps behind the Safety Car to allow drivers to acclimatize to the fading light and worsening rain, the field were released in the order they finished lap four, the last racing lap completed before the race was stopped by a hailstorm.

That meant Maro Engel in the pole-sitting no. 9 Black Falcon Mercedes-AMG GT3 led the field away from the restart, from Jörg Müller in the No. 18 Schubert Motorsport BMW M6 GT3 and No. 88 Haribo Mercedes.

During the stoppage, Engel explained just how bad conditions were.

“It was crazy, everyone was losing control of their car going 30-40 km/h,” he told Sportscar365. “I was aquaplaning and had no control of the car for maybe 400 meters, everyone was just trying to somehow survive.

“The team gave me a warning and everything, I really slowed down but once you got on the grass it was very hard to stay out of the barriers.

“I lightly touched the barrier at Schwedenkreuz on the exit, the guys had a look at the car to check all the tows and the alignments to make sure everything is where it should be. I’m just relieved that both our cars are still in the race.”