A 131-car field will assemble this weekend for the back-to-back four-hour Qualifying races for the 2024 24 Hours of the Nürburgring.
28 SP9 cars built to GT3 regulations, plus the SPX entry of the (GT3 performance spec), Glickenhaus headline an entry stacked with factory and factory-level talent.
The 2024-race-winning Frickadelli Racing Ferrari effort returns with a new-look squad. Daniel Keilwitz, Felipe Fernandez Laser, Luca Ludwig and Nico Varrone are set to form the crew for the 24 Hours, and all four look set to play a part over the weekend’s action.
Aston Martin has no fewer than five entries with its GT3 Vantages. The #17 ProSport Competition car of Nico Bastian, Marek Böckmannand Yelmer Buurmann, and the #34 Walkenhorst Motorsport car of Kuba Giermaziak, Christian Krognes, David Pittard and Nicki Thiim are likely to be the quickest alongside a further pair of Walkenhorst cars and a solo entry from Dörr Motorsport.
Four current-spec Audis feature with the pair from Scherer Sport PHX looking the strongest, the #15 fielding Frederic Vervisch, Christopher Haase and Dennis Marschall whilst the sister #16 names Frank Stippler, Chris Mies and Ricardo Feller. Equipe Vitesse and JUTA Racing field another Audi apiece.
A trio of strong BMW M4 GT3s is composed of a pair of ROWE Racing Cars and a single car from BMW M Team RMG.
ROWE field Raffaele Marciello, Maxime Martin and Marco Wittmann in its #98, with Augusto Farfus, Sheldon van der Linde and Dries Vanthoor in the sister #99.
RMG fields BMW’s Gen2K Young Guns squad of Dan Harper, Max Hesse and Charles Weerts.
Lamborghini has two Huaracan GT3 EVO2s on the entry, the #27 Red Bull Team Abt trio of Jordan Pepper, Kelvin van der Linde and Marco Mapelli will be looking to sweep away the memory of a last-gasp loss at last weekend’s VLN2. A second Huracan is fielded by the evergreen Franz Konrad.
Mercedes is represented by seven AMG GT3s with a mighty quintet of cars with factory backing. HRT’s pair will run under the Mercedes-AMG Team BILSTEIN banner, its #3 car for Maxi Goetz, Dani Juncadella, Arjun Maini and Luca Stolz, the #4 sees Maini also listed alongside Michele Beretta, Frank Bird and Jusuf Owega.
Mercedes AMG Team Getspeed fields three factory-backed cars: The #8 has Lucas Auer joined by Adam Christodoulou and Mikael Grenier, the #9 sees Philip Ellis teamed with Grenier (again) and Fabian Schiller whilst the #130 sees Christodoulou on double duty together with Maro Engel and Jules Gounon.
HRT will run a third car and there’s a solo AMG too for Schnitzelalm Racing.
Porsche has six representatives in the top class with five of them full Pro cars. Falken Motorsports will race with its pair of 911 GT3 Rs, the #33 for Julien Andlauer, Klaus Bachler, Sven Mueller and Alessio Picariello, the #44 also listed with Mueller but joined by Tim Heinemann, Nico Menzel and Martin Ragginger.
Herberth Motorsport field a 1994 Le Mans heritage-liveried #5 for Porsche returnee Dennis Olsen, Vincent Kolb and Robert Renauer.
Dinamic GT’s #54 sees Bastian Buus, Marvin Dienst, Marco Holzer and Marco Seefried combine. Finally, the iconic ‘Grello’ #911 of Manthey EMA sees Ayhancan Guven and Thomas Preining combine. A sixth Porsche will run in the form of a Pro-Am crew by Lionspeed GP – PK Motorsport.
Glickenhaus meanwhile fields its planned 24 Hours quartet of Thomas Mutsch, Franck Mailleux, Lance David Arnold and Côme Ledogar in the #709 SCG 004c.
As always there are names to note in the supporting classes. This weekend’s crop includes IMSA star Mike Skeen in the #166 BMW M4 GT4. The AT (Alternative technology) bio fuelled #420 Porsche Cayman sees an interesting duo named – Porsche factory men Felipe Nasr and Bastian Buus (doing double duty with the Dinamic SP9 entry)!
It remains to be seen whether the #831 Hyundai Motosport N / Target Competition Elantra TCR effort will appear after the car suffered significant damage last weekend in NLS2. Robert Wickens, Harry Gottsacker, Maison Filippi and Mark Wilkins are currently listed.
Saturday’s race starts at 5:30 p.m. CEST, running into darkness. The Sunday’s starts at 13:00 CEST. Both are available streamed with English-language commentary.
