The 2026 edition of the Nürburgring 24 Hours was full of storylines and superlatives - and that might have had the side effect of doing motorsport as a whole a favor.
A new attendance record, throwbacks to 1990s DTM cars, a four-time F1 Champion making his debut, the biggest grid in years, and a BMW wagon - the 2026 Nürburgring 24 Hours was a highly memorable event. Sensational even, if you consider that compared to 2025, where the race was already quite packed, about 72,000 more fans showed up for a grand total of 352,000. That's not just a lot, that's more than at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, and in the ballpark of the Indianapolis 500.
At the same time, plenty of additional eyes were on the event's official live streams. Make no mistake: Interest in the 2026 Nürburgring 24 Hours was extraordinarily high. And those who watched were treated to quite the contest, heartbreak and surprises alike included.
SPOILER WARNING: In case you have not watched the race until the end yet, be advised that after this point, race results may be discussed. But we'd be happy for you to come back after you finished watching and reading this article!
A Packed Nürburgring Shows Its Best Side
Of course, the biggest storyline leading into the event was the debut of Max Verstappen. Having competed in a handful of NLS events in preparation, the four-time F1 World Champion would make is debut in not just the Nürburgring 24 Hours, but in a 24-hour race in general. With teammates Dani Juncadella, Lucas Auer and Jules Gounon, it was quite a strong lineup in the Verstappen.com Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo run by Winward Racing.
With the immensely popular Dutchman present at the Nürburgring, that meant a lot of extra attention on the event as well. F1 fans from around the world tuned in or even traveled to the Eifel to watch Verstappen race, and that meant that for many "mainstream" fans, they would be exposed to GT racing and the Green Hell-flavored variant of it for the very first time.
Now, "mainstream" is not meant to be negative in this context. Many fans that are not as deep into the motorsport rabbit hole are only used to F1, meaning that it is the measuring stick for anything racing related.
By racing in the N24, Max may have opened the eyes of quite a big amount of racing fans out there. It sure seems like he did, seeing how comments and posts on social media have praised the event - even under one of F1's own Instagram posts.
"Imma Switch To Endurance"
On Sunday, so the day of the Nürburgring 24's finish, the official F1 account posted a slideshow about what "F1 is...", emphasizing things such as the team-based nature, its history, and the like. Fans flocked to the comment section, but probably not in the way F1 would have liked. Instead, the post looks like an immense own goal now.
The comment section is full of fans praising the Nürburgring event, highlighting "pure racing, no batteries, no yo-yo overtakes", one user even commenting "imma switch to endurance now". This comes off the back of the controversial and somewhat unpopular rule changes ahead of the 2026 season that put energy management to the forefront more than ever.
Indeed, it seems like Verstappen's participation introduced quite a large number of fans to a whole new discipline of racing, and in a very positive way. They may have been aware of its existence before, but perhaps never really took a closer look - that has changed now, and it could potentially mean a resurgence of general popularity of motorsport.
In a way, F1's global rise in popularity over the last few years has laid the foundation for this. Verstappen is a household name these days, people know that he is one of the best drivers in the world, if not the best. Based on this, a lot of eyeballs followed Max from the Miami Grand Prix to the Eifel, and they might wander off on their own to check out other endurance races now, such as the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
At a time when motorsport in general seems to be on the decline a bit, with a few exceptions, this is a refreshing development - it is good to see that it can still be popular. It also shows that star power is important - so personally, I'm hoping that more star drivers take the plunge to drive in other events and disciplines if they want to, like drivers used to do until the mid-1990s or so.
Image: Gruppe C Photography
Great Pace, But Rotten Luck For The #3
As expected, the #3 Verstappen.com Mercedes did very well through most of the race, running at the front of the pack and leading the pack for quite some distance. Verstappen showed his class in multiple stints, and Juncadella, Auer, and Gounon clearly showed that their experience in endurance racing makes them some of the top drivers out there.
That made it all the more heartbreaking when the car had to stop due to a broken drive shaft with just 3.5 hours to go, handing over the lead to the #80 Winward Mercedes driven by Maro Engel, Maxime Martin, Fabian Schiller and Luca Stolz. The quartet went on to secure the first Mercedes triumph in the event in ten years, with the #84 Abt Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2 (Mirko Bortolotti, Luca Engstler, Patric Niederhauser) and the #34 Walkenhorst Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 Evo (Mattia Drudi, Felipe Fernández Laser, Christian Krognes, Nicki Thiim) completing the podium.
In a way, it was probably good that the #3 didn't just disappeared into the distance to win the event. Had the super team assembled around Verstappen easily won the race on their first attempt, it might have led to some seeing the Nürburgring 24 as an "easy" event that an F1 driver could just roll into and win if they pleased. The car's DNF showed the cruelty of endurance racing instead - you can be the fastest team by a mile all day, but you might still leave the track empty-handed if you are unlucky.
Image: Gruppe C Photography
BMW's Rapid Wagon Beats Most Of The GT3s
The Verstappen factor was undeniably a big part of what made the 2026 Nürburgring 24 Hours such an enormous success, but there was a lot more to it, of course. We highlighted some of the oddball cars in the race before the start, and one of the biggest fan favorites of the weekend was the BMW M3 Touring 24H.
What started as an April Fools joke in 2025 was turned into reality for 2026 - a wagon turned into a GT3 car. Since it was not homologated as a GT3 like BMW's M4 GT3 Evo, it did not run in the same class (SP9), but rather in the SP-X class for cars that don't fit any other class - the same another set of oddballs ran in, namely the three HWA EVO.R cars that are based on the Mercedes 190E 2.5-16 Evo II.
While the best HWA finished in P61 overall, the BMW wagon was a front-runner, even battling with the Verstappen Mercedes at times. Driven by Jens Klingmann, Ugo de Wilde, Connor de Phillippi, and Neil Verhagen, the car beat most of the regular GT3 grid and was the second-fastest BMW overall, crossing the line in P5, just under two minutes behind the fastest M4 GT3 Evo (Daniel Harper, Max Hesse, Sheldon van der Linde, Dries Vanthoor).
Favorites Retire Early On
Other fan favorites such as the #911 Manthey Porsche 911 (992) GT3.R that fans call Grello due to its bright yellow livery, went out even before night fell at the Nürburgring. The first retirement of the day was the second Walkenhorst Aston Martin, two of the three HRT-run Ford Mustang GT3s went out before the halfway mark, as did 2025's race-winning BMW (Augusto Farfus, Raffaele Marciello, Jordan Pepper, Kelvin van der Linde).
All of this shows the enormous challenge that is the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring - even if you are a favorite and have been at the top in the past, nothing is guaranteed.
The result of this historic edition of the Nürburgring 24 Hours: Hopefully more fans that are exclusively into F1 looking into other disciplines now to find more racing that they'll enjoy, providing a boost to motorsport in general. Will it ever reach the heights of the 1990s and early 2000s again? Probably not, but there could be potential here for more popularity in general.
Image: Gruppe C Photography
What did you think of the 2026 Nürburgring 24 Hours? How many hours did you manage to watch? Let us know in the comments below and join the discussion in our motorsport forum!