Event Features
Rolex24 Race Report
By Text: Jim Sykes
Feb 2, 2007, 19:09

When the Grand American Road Racing Association announced its plans for the future of sportscar racing in the form of the Daytona Prototype, many people had their doubts. Would the DP formula really work? Was this just the “dumbing down” of sportscar racing in the United States? Would anyone really latch onto this formula and embrace it? After all, sportscar racing had always been the “Formula 1” of fendered cars. It was the latest technology put forth in factory prototypes that showcased both speed and beauty.

To many, the Daytona Prototype was not sportscar racing. They were slower than their Le Mans counterparts and were, basically, a spec series that did not encourage or support high tech engineering and development that had driven sportscar racing for the last 70 decades. How could this possibly work?

Well, on January 28th, as the checkered flag fell on the 45th running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona, I think that those questions have been more than answered by Grand Am and the Daytona Prototype formula.

In the third closest finish in the 45 year history of the race, Chip Ganassi Racing’s 01 Lexus powered Riley, driven by Scott Pruett, Juan Montoya and Salvador Duran, crossed the finish line 1:15.842 ahead of the second place car of CITGO Racing driven by Patrick Carpentier after 24 hours of racing. The two cars, along with the number 10 SunTrust Pontiac Riley, had been battling back and forth for the lead over the last several hours of the race before Scott Pruett was able to pull away with about an hour left in the event.

The 01 car of Chip Ganassi racing never fell out of the top three over the last 21 hours of the race, but with about four hours to go, while being driven by Montoya, they were in a nose to tail battle being lead by the number 11 CITGO/SAMAX Pontiac Riley driven by Ryan Dalziel and being pressured from behind by the SunTrust car driven by Max Angelelli. Dalziel was able to keep both of the accomplished road racers behind him and let Montoya and Angelelli swap positions back and forth on numerous occasions. The battle continued for about an hour until Dalziel had to pit for fuel and tires and turned the driving duties over to Patrick Carpentier. Shortly thereafter, Montoya passed Angelelli for the lead, which the team held for the remainder of the race. Angelelli pitted to turn the car over to Jan Magnussen and Montoya turned his car over to Scott Pruett. The Ganassi team held the lead through the round of pit stops, and Pruett went on to lengthen that lead to take home the victory.

"We got three cars going for it on the lead lap with a couple of hours to go with very talented drivers putting on a fantastic show," Pruett said. "That's what this is all about. When you get down to the very last stages of the race and be doing that, it says a lot about the series and the teams with the way they prep the cars and race them. This is no small feat getting everything going for this race between the people and the cars and all the preparation. It's just fantastic. I can't say enough for all the participants and everybody that came and saw it."


With this race providing great racing down to the final hour or so, the DP formula is proving its worth. With the cars being designed to be incredibly equal, they are able to fight back and forth over long endurance races and give multiple teams the opportunity to be at the top in the end. Even though they are not quite as fast or as exotic as other sportscar series on the planet, I don’t think anyone can argue that the racing has not proved to be some of the best and closest out there. In the United States, where NASCAR dominates the racing landscape the Daytona Prototypes and Grand Am are providing exactly what the average U.S. fan wants to see, wheel to wheel racing.

In addition to the close racing the numbers of entries have exploded, with 28 Daytona Prototypes contesting the Rolex this year. This has shown that the formula is also working for teams and drivers and they have, indeed, embraced the series by buying cars and bringing them to the show. A race such as this can only encourage more teams to come and be a part of such great racing in the future.

While the DP has been what the story Grand Am has revolved around the last several years, the other very important part of the equation is the GT class. This class has also not been without its controversy. Again, in an attempt to provide close and cost controlled racing, Grand Am introduced the “prep 2” rules, which allow for tubed framed and composite bodies to be entered in the class alongside true unibody vechicles. This has also caused a bit of angst among some who were afraid that the “silhouette” style of car would end up dominating the class and they would end up with, simply, the same car underneath different bodies. This idea is often compared to NASCAR, where front drive cars are converted to rear drive and you have V8s in cars that you cannot get one in from the factory. Many do not like this idea and want to see a car win based on the factory design, however, the idea has proven to do just what it was meant to do, encourage close and equal racing among multiple makes of cars.

This year at the Rolex, just like in the DP class, this formula proved its worth as the Alegra Motorsports/Fiorano Racing Porsche GT3 brought home the victory by only 7.072 seconds over the Banner Racing Pontiac GXP-R in its race debut. In addition to the incredibly close finish after 24 hours of racing, the GT class was also the largest field in a single class in the history of the race, further showing its viability.

The Alegra/Fiorano team of Scooter Gabel, Jean-Francois Dumoulin, Carlos de Quesada and Marc Basseng took the lead with about 90 minutes to go in the race, when the leading number 85 Porsche of Farnbacher Loles had to pit due to a persistent oil leak.

"There were so many good cars out there," said Dumoulin, a 2004 Rolex 24 SGS class winner. "We needed to be quick without doing too much harm to the car. We were able to keep our head down and stay ahead of them. It was a lot of fun."

The debut of the Banner Racing Pontiac GXP-R proved to be mighty successful with the team of Paul Edwards, Kelly Collins, Andy Pilgrim and Johnny O’Connell taking the second position in the GT class in the new car.

“The last half hour was tough,” said Edwards with a shrug but a smile as well. “It was like the German Autobahn out there will all of those Porsches. They never made it easy, that’s for sure!”

“It was Pontiac reliability, our driver’s consistency and the dedicated teamwork of the Banner Racing crew that allowed us to be in contention for the win in the Rolex 24 after 23 hours of racing,” said Leighton Reese proudly after the race.

Third place was captured by the number 64 TRG Porsche, followed by the second Banner Racing GXP-R and the SpeedSource Mazda RX-8 who rounded out the top five in the GT class.

This finish really showed that both the prep 1 and prep 2 cars could compete equally. The Porsche GT3s in first and third were both “prep 1” factory based vehicles, while the Pontiacs in 2nd and 4th along with the 5th place Mazda were all “prep 2” cars, built on custom racing chassis with bodywork emulating the factory cars they are based on. With a mix of finishes such as that between the two varieties of cars, Grand Am has come up with, what seems to be, a very equal formula for the cars which will only lead to further close and competitive racing in the class.

All in all, the 45th running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona proved to be one of the best in history and, at the same time, has shown that Grand Am was really onto something half a decade ago when they introduced the new rules by which they currently live. Will the formula ever truly win over the sportscar racing die-hards and purists? Probably not, but at the same time they cannot deny the close racing and large fields that the rules have provided. Whether you like the cars or not, the racing is good, its wheel to wheel and should continue to be so well into the future in the Grand Am Rolex series.

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