Max Verstappen in the mix for Portimao victory, Dutchman set for final stint
Photo: SRO/JEP
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Henry Eccles is a freelance Formula 1 journalist for GPblog, covering breaking news, live race blogs, and features across the F1 calendar. Since joining in 2026, he has produced high-volume reporting on the sport’s biggest stories, alongside feature pieces including analysis and historical content.
Max Verstappen will take the final stint in the three-hour GT World Challenge Europe finale in Portimao for his team Verstappen Racing. After a strong first stint from teammate Ben Barnicoat, and impressive racing by Chris Lulham, the Dutchman's team are currently P6.
Suffering set up woes in Qualifying, Verstappen Racing started the endurance race in P13 - bumped up two places after penalties ahead of the race. Barnicoat raced well to gain a further two places upon race start, and was up to P8 by the time of the first pit stop and driver change.
Enter sim racer Chris Lulham, whose brilliant move at Turn 7 on the #64 Mustang of Thomas Drouet brought the team up to P6. The Briton has continued to show impressive pace, bringing the gap to leader down from nine seconds to five with just under 90 minutes of action remaining.
Among the front runners during the first stint was Alessio Picariello, who lost his Boutsen VDS Porsche's lead to the GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG, and anticipates Verstappen to be in the fight.
He told GTWC Europe: "The Mercs now will come to life, and I expect a tough fight at the end, especially with Max, so I'm looking forward to seeing this with my Dutch teammate, as well. So it will be interesting."
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Verstappen lowers expectations in Portimao
Set to take the final stint is Verstappen himself, who had tempered expectations prior to race start. The Dutchman told GTWC Europe: "I think we had a little bit more pace at the Nordschliefe. It's a very long track, right? So the speed differences can be quite a bit bigger between brands. Here, I think what you could see already in practice, a lot of brands are very close to each other."
Barnicoat and Lulham, however, have helped give Verstappen as good a chance as possible to fight the frontrunners, with visibility starting to lower as the sun sets in Portimao.
Despite his low expectations ahead of the race, Verstappen had no doubts over the abilities of his teammates. He said: "It's a really good team. It was just unfortunate for us yesterday that we couldn't really show that. It's not easy to step in, even for myself, but, of course, also for Ben.
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"But yeah, we are just very excited, you know, we want to have a good time. Of course, we want to try and move forward. But let's see, I think it's gonna be an interesting race."
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