Verstappen starting 15th for GT return; Boutsen VDS Porsche takes Portimao pole

Boutsen VDS secured its first-ever Endurance Cup pole in Friday evening’s qualifying session for the SRO World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup finale at Portimão, which features Formula 1 star Max Verstappen returning to GT racing for the first time since the Nürburgring 24 Hours back in May. The Dutchman and his two teammates had a difficult qualifying session with their Silver Cup class Mercedes, though, and will start 15th in the massive 61-car field for Saturday night’s three-hour race.

The Belgian Boutsen VDS squad topped Q1 and Q2 with its No. 2 Porsche 911 GT3 R EVO (pictured above) thanks to drivers Morris Schuring and Dorian Boccolacci. The times improved across the sessions, with Schuring posting a 1m42.445s and Boccolacci circulating in 1m41.856s. This put the Boutsen VDS squad in a commanding position, and Alessio Picarellio was able to finish the job by placing P7 in the final session.

The result has been a long time coming for Boutsen VDS, which made its series debut at Monza in 2012. This was also Porsche’s first Endurance Cup pole in a little over two years, as well as the first for all three drivers.

The No. 17 Mercedes-AMG Team GetSpeed crew of Ralf Aron, Maximilian Götz and Fabian Schiller qualified second, preventing a Porsche one-two by jumping ahead of the No. 80 Lionspeed GP entry in Q3.

HRT Ford Racing was fourth on a strong day for the German outfit’s Ford Mustang GT3 EVO, followed by the No. 50 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO. The No. 48 Mercedes-AMG Team Mann-Filter squad – which secured the series’ Endurance Cup drivers’ title last time out at the Nürburgring – completed the top six.

In a further development Winward Racing, which operates the No. 48 Mercedes-AMG, has also wrapped up the Endurance Cup teams’ title. This is because Comtoyou Racing did not secure pole and the accompanying bonus point, which was essential to keep its faint hopes alive.

Selected Car Racing will start from Gold Cup pole position thanks to an excellent showing from its No. 71 Ferrari. Frederik Schandorff, Malte Ebdrup and Simon Birch were at the controls, the latter setting a 1m41.652s, which was the fastest time of Q3. Indeed, this would prove to be the best lap of the entire qualifying session.

Silver Cup pole went to the No. 65 HRT Ford Racing crew of Eduardo Coseteng, Maxime Oosten and Nicolas Baert. This was the team’s second class pole of 2026 after Monza and will see the Mustang start from P13 overall. It will roll off alongside the No. 32 Team WRT BMW and directly ahead of the No. 3 Mercedes-AMG Team Verstappen entry, which the four-time world champion is sharing with Ben Barnicoat and Chris Lulham. Verstappen’s day got off to a slow start after nudging an Audi into a spin in practice (below), earning him a stewards’ reprimand, and all three drivers struggled with the handling of their Mercedes throughout qualifying.

Paradine Competition took Bronze Cup pole thanks to its No. 991 BMW crew of Darren Leung, James Kellett and Robert de Haan. This was the team’s first pole of the 2026 Endurance campaign and boosts its chances of overhauling Kessel Racing in the drivers’ title fight.

The final race of the 2026 GT World Challenge powered by AWS season gets underway at 5:00pm local time (10pm ET) on Saturday evening. Free live coverage will air in multiple languages on the GT World YouTube channel.

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