Max Verstappen reacts after surprise Mercedes failure at the Nurburgring

Max Verstappen has reacted to the surprise Mercedes failure, which affected his GT3 car at the Nurburgring. 

The Dutchman started Sunday's event at the Nordschleife and was running strongly before a splitter failure caused him to pit and drop out of contention for the victory with team-mate Lucas Auer.

Detailing just what had happened 90 minutes into his stint, Verstappen was in the dark about the cause of the failure. 

"On the second lap of my second stint, all of a sudden a lot of vibrations came," Verstappen told Viaplay. "Then the splitter also suddenly started clattering really hard. At that moment, I knew it had broken off. That was kind of it."

"I didn't touch anybody, so I don't know how it happened. We have to find out exactly where it went wrong. There are more Mercedes cars competing and things are going well there. Hopefully, we can sort it out."

During his time on track, Verstappen engaged in a lively battle with Christopher Haase, which he labelled as "pretty intense."

"I did manage to drive my stints reasonably well; again, a little bit with traffic. That was pretty intense, also to fight against other GT3 cars. In that area, it went completely well. The car also felt good, so I'm happy about that."

"We prepared as well as we could for the 24 Hours. I just didn't drive in the dark, that's all. I drove in the rain, did starts and started at different positions in dry conditions. That's all you can do, I guess."