We've crossed over into single digits on the clock for time remaining in the Rolex 24. We have a scheduled pit stop for the race leader, the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing Konica Minolta Cadillac. Kamui Kobayashi has been flying and will do another stint. They have refueled the car and may not take tires. No. They had tires ready but did not change them. Fuel only, and a 33 second pit stop if you saw the purple colored positional light. Because of the jet black livery, in the dark of night, you can lose the car in the gloom except for the ID light, the blue ID light and the cherry red glowing brake discs. We are thankful to "Rooftop Ray", the cameraman who stands atop the main grandstand building with his camera, and gives us incredible pictures for the TV broadcasts around the world. He is on his 25th consecutive Rolex 24, as cameraman for the night shift. Congratulations to you, sir!
In DPi, Kamui Kobayashi leads overall and in class, ahead of Sebastien Bourdais in the #5 Mustang Sampling JDC-Miller Cadillac, and in third, the #31 Whelen Engineering Racing Action Express Cadillac, Mike Conway at the wheel of it. Conway is catching Bourdais after the #5 car pitted. Oliver Jarvis holds fourth spot aboard the #77 Mazda Team Joest Mazda RT24P. Then comes the sister Mazda, #55, followed by Juan Pablo Montoya in the #6 Penske Racing Acura ARX05 DPi. Rahel Frey says she and her team mates are back in the race after losing more than 30 laps with mechanical woes. But, the #19 GRT Grasser car is back in the race. The trouble had to do with the fuel tank and the fuel pressure. Now, it's likely fixed. Poor old Joe Bradley is trying to navigate his way out of the garage and back into the pit lane to keep the coverage going, along with our buddy Jonny Palmer on IMSA Radio.
Into turn one on the road course, we watch the #48 Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3, scored as the leader in GT Daytona, ahead of the #44 Magnus Racing, Flex Box (Flexi Box, if you like), Lamborghini, now, with John Potter behind the wheel. Potter is second in class, and close to Corey Lewis. He's just a shade over a second behind, just a few car lengths. Maybe 10-12 car lengths. Lewis is catching Mario Farnbacher aboard the #86 MSR Acura NSX GT3, which is a number of laps behind in the running order already, 14th in class. In DPi, the rest of the order is Mattheus Leist in the #85 JDC-Miller Cadillac, the yellow car known as "the banana boat".
Alexander Rossi is eighth in class aboard the #7 Penske Racing Acura, and he is recovering. Recall the major crash the car had at the beginning of the motor race, yesterday, about three or four hours into the action. It took 38 minutes for the Penske team to repair the car after the shunt. He is back in step on the timing screen, only. The car remains 22 laps behind the overall leader. Chaz Mostert leads GT Le Mans, in the #24 BMW M8 GT that we've seen a lot of in recent time, especially when it last made a pit stop. There's a Bunsen Burner effect, of blue flames shooting out of the exhausts off the #3 Corvette. Schools and science classes, they don't use Bunsen burners anymore, but still, that's pretty amazing.
It's burning exhaust gases coming out of the tailpipe. Is that wasted energy or is it fuel? This is the very same motor that Corvette has been using for years. It's a 5.5 liter V8 normally aspirated engine. But, because it is now mid engine and also, the crankshaft has been redesigned so it is a flat plane crankshaft, the engine note is totally different. The #12 Lexus RC F GT3 is in the garage. Shane van Gisbergen has brought the car into the garage. Yours truly thought it was the same motor in the Corvette as it used to be. It is, but it's a redesigned, brand new motor. The crankshaft is machined and installed entirely differently.
It is a different engine, but it's a top secret development right now. The tailpipes are pretty short, and with the power, it shoots flames out the back, and does the same thing in the daytime. This car has straight exhausts and they were curved on the old front engine C-7-R, according to team manager for Corvette, Dan Binks. The #4 car is getting set to come back out on track. The engine in the new Corvette is perhaps a top secret deal. But, we won't speculate. The car is running extremely well as it is catching up to the sister Porsche 911 RSR-19 in third place in class. BMW, Porsche, Porsche, Chevrolet. The two Porsche's are split by 21 seconds. Chaz Mostert is just seven seconds away from the #912 Porsche 911 RSR-19, Matthieu Jaminet at the controls. It's the Matty and Matty show at Porsche. Matthieu Jaminet in the #912 car, and in the #911, Matt Campbell.
Antonio Garcia is driving the #3 Corvette C8.R and Daniel Serra is still racing in the #62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE. In DPi, the #7 Acura is in the lane. A quick stop for Alexander Rossi who has three LMP2 cars ahead before he catches up to the other DPi cars. They are running, picking up points, and they can still finish the motor race. They will lose just a small number of points at a dozen. 23 points total. The other seven DPi cars are running in metronomic fashion, still pounding 'round the circuit here at Daytona.
Cadillac has all three podium spots. Simon Trummer leads LMP2 in the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports car. He runs 48 seconds ahead of the #81 DragonSpeed car in the hands of Ben Hanley. All the LMP2 cars are utilizing the normally aspirated British built Gibson 4.2 liter V8 power plant. Dries Vanthoor is in the #88 WRT Speedstar Audi R8, chasing down the #63 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 GT3, and then ahead of him lie the #16 Porsche for Wright Motorsports with Klaus Bachler driving, the #96 Turner Motorsports BMW M6 GT3 in the hands of Bill Auberlen, the #44 GRT Magnus Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 of John Potter, and leading in class, still, the #48 Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 in the hands of Corey Lewis. Lewis is 19th in the overall.
In GTLM, the gap between Chaz Mostert and Matthieu Jaminet, has come down a bit, down to 5.4 seconds ahead of all the aforementioned cars. 42 seconds between the top five in GTLM and all four brands! Wow! That's incredible! If there's a caution, anyone could have a chance in GTLM. In GTD, it depends on which drivers are plugged in. You run a bare minimum of a couple Silver rated drivers, and then, a Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum driver. You amateur drivers have to be at least two Silver's and maybe a Bronze. Leave the quicker drivers to the end of the motor race. Do you stick the hot shoes in for qualifying? Or, do you stick in the fast amateurs? Whoever qualifies, has to start the race.
In the FIA WEC, we'll have the grandfathered LMP1 cars, the new Hypercar division (with Toyota and Aston Martin, and then eventually, Peugeot), and the new LMDh division, which includes the new generation DPi cars. This is all very exciting. but must be taken as a measured approach although DPi 2.0 is very exciting. This hearkens back to the extremely mixed grids seen in the World Sports Car Championship, during the 1970s. So, it is easy to get nostalgic about what is to come, but, that being said, we must have patience, and must make sure all of this is done in a proper way. Let us not be hasty about it.
Some teams are definitely interested in this new formula. But, still others, are taking a more measured approach. We shall await more details coming up at the Sebring 12 Hours. It would be fun to see the Rolex 24 back as part of a world championship scenario. We've already got various race lengths in the WEC of four, six and eight hours, as well as the upcoming 1,000 Miles of Sebring. We have not yet had a 24 hour race and a 12 hour event in the WEC calendar. In 2012, there was a combined grid between the WEC and the old American Le Mans Series for the 12 Hours of Sebring. It was fairly complex. You could run a 12 Hours of Sebring, with both championships, perhaps. The Daytona 24 Hours would be halfway through the FIA WEC. It is fun to think about all of this, but we must see reality for what it is at the moment.
The umbrella formula of LMP1, LMDh, and DPi 2.0, seems extremely exciting, though. It is like having a two way soccer game, four teams on the pitch, and two pitches going in opposite directions. Jeepers! We need some action to get us back to reality, and we've got it, with the #31 Whelen Cadillac making a standard pit stop, Mike Conway remaining at the wheel of it. We still have nine and a half hours to go, five miles inland from the Atlantic Ocean, 50 miles northeast of Orlando. Our next event is also in Florida, on March 18th-21st, the 68th annual 12 Hours of Sebring, on the fabled and yet rough concrete runways of Sebring International Raceway, formerly known as Hendricks Field, a B17 bomber base during WW. II.
You will have a lot of sports car racing to enjoy on this blog, that weekend, as there's the 1,000 Miles of Sebring for the FIA World Endurance Championship and also, the 12 Hours of Sebring, both on Friday and on Saturday that weekend. Matthieu Jaminet is putting in the graveyard stint aboard the #912 Porsche 911 RSR-19 chasing Melbourne, Australia's Chaz Mostert in the #24 BMW M8 GTE. Refer to your trusty Andy Blackmore spotters guide to tell the difference between the liveries of the two factory Porsche's. The #25 BMW M8 GTE, which has had a myriad of troubles throughout the race, is now being piloted by Bruno Spengler. Spengler is clear of the long delayed #4 silver Chevrolet Corvette C8.R in the hands of Marcel Fassler.
Matty Jaminet in the sister Porsche continues to run 1.6 seconds behind. Meanwhile, you've missed nothing in GT Daytona, as the two different Lamborghini Huracan's continue running 1-2 in the division. Paul Miller Racing vs. GRT Magnus. In the meantime, also in GTD, the battle is heating up between Klaus Bachler, and Dries Vanthoor. Bachler just ran a 1:46.7 and is slower than Vanthoor through traffic at the moment. Vanthoor shall have to deal with this same traffic. Into the pit lane, we have the fourth place Ferrari #63 in GTD. Cooper MacNeil came into the lane and finished his stint. He won a Ferrari Challenge race earlier this weekend of course.
The Lamborghini's are dominating GTD, but the gap is closing as Dries Vanthoor is turning it on trying to catch Klaus Bachler. Cooper MacNeil says the car is very strong and they are in contention in their class, and has given credit to his co-drivers like Jeff Westphal and Toni Vilander. We've got basically a Petit Le Mans left to go in terms of distance/time. Well, time at least. The conditions on track are always changing here at Daytona from one session to the next, or in the race, from one hour to the next. Ah. We see a car going off the road and back on in turn five. It is the #88 Audi. We're nearly 15 hours into the motor race.
Now, we're back to gazing into the crystal ball, looking to the future for just a moment. A comment on the IMSA Radio Twitter feed says, "with the new regulations coming in 2021, we will have the best sounding Le Mans since the '80s during the Group C era." V12 Aston, Corvette, Cadillac, Porsche 911, and more. Well, the dates are still up in the air. In 2020 to 2021 we will see the Hypercar machines run. The next season, 2021 to 2022, will surely be the convergence season. DPi 2.0 has been pushed back to 2022. September 2021 will be the beginning of convergence. Hypercar and LMP1 from this current era will be in the WEC before we see the new DPi 2.0 cars run in the WEC if they wish to or if they are capable of doing so.
BMW Team RLL may step away at the end of the 2020 IMSA season and people don't want it to disappear. The M8 GTE left as a factory team, the FIA WEC, after Le Mans 2019. Fans want them back and would like to see BMW Team RLL get a Le Mans invitation. We will just have to see what unfolds. Team MTEK ran the M8's in the WEC. In the next few weeks we shall know who will be invited to Le Mans. In the meantime, there's still a GTLM battle being fought, half a second between Mostert and Jaminet, in the BMW and the Porsche. This is getting spicy again, folks. They drive through the International Horseshoe.
The grayer Porsche is chansing, with the white car behind it, both in hot pursuit of the BMW which runs a tad wide around the #88 Audi we've talked about. Vanthoor has gone ahead of Klaus Bachler and Bachler at the controls of the #16 Wright Motorsports Porsche, he is still in the lane. 'Round speedway turn four they go, and Jaminet (a.k.a. "Jam Jam"), he's about to put a lap on the sister Porsche. The two Porsche's are a lap apart but they are still chasing the leading BMW. The BMW and the Porsche are dicing, hard. The #48 Lamborghini and the #85 Cadillac are returning to the track. Andrea Caldarelli is battling John Potter, and now, Dennis Olsen is at the wheel of the #9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R.
The Norwegian driver Dennis Olsen is going for it, and now, he is driving for customer teams. Both GTLM leaders are in pit lane now. BMW and Porsche are both in the lane. Chaz Mostert and Matthieu Jaminet. There could have been a driver change for the #24 car. Nope. The BMW holds the GT Le Mans lead. Jesse Krohn is now at the controls of the #24 BMW and Matthieu Jaminet is still in the Porsche, 1.3 seconds behind. But, Jaminet is pushing, pushing, pushing. "Jam Jam" still has warm tires while Jesse Krohn has cold Michelin's on that BMW and "Jam Jam" is going for the class lead on the banking, look.
Jaminet takes the ckass kead going into speedway turn one. Wow. He's putting daylight between himself and Jesse Krohn who could be passed, too, by the #74 Riley Motorsports GTD Mercedes with Lawson Aschenbach driving. Jonathan Bomarito in Mazda #55 swoops around the GTLM leaders, too. This is close racing as we are coming closer to the end of another hour of motor racing in ten or so minutes. Matt Campbell at the wheel of the sister #911 Porsche is really steaming along, running a personal best for him, and the car, in sector one. The gap from second to third in GTLM is 20 seconds.
In the overall, in DPi, it is still the #10 car out front. Renger van der Zande now behind the wheel, has a 34 second cushion over Mike Conway in the #31 Whelen Action Express Cadillac. Conway has nine seconds over Sebastien Bourdais in the #5 JDC-Miller Cadillac. Behind Bourdais it is both of the Mazda Team Joest Mazda RT24P DPi's with Oliver Jarvis in #77 and Jonathan Bomarito in #55. Rounding out the top of the tree, for the DPi machines is Dane Cameron in the contending #6 Team Penske Acura, and Mattheus Leist in the sister JDC-Miller Cadillac, car #85. That's the yellow "banana boat" car.
The scrum in GTLM continues through the western horseshoe headed back to the banking. Simon Trummer, the LMP2 leader, he is a slight obstacle for the GTLM leaders. Dennis Olsen and John Potter both are in pit lane in GTD. Andrea Caldarelli is pitting well before the other GTD entries or so it appears. It's too early to back time your stints, yet. Take an hour, maybe 65 minutes for a stint on fuel saving. In other championships, 65 minutes is a mandatory stint time in an endurance race, but these are championships that use identical machinery in the form of GT3 cars, such as those we are seeing in GT Daytona, and the rules are a whole different kettle of fish.
This is an epic scrap in GTLM. Matt Campbell is catching the two blokes at the front of the class. We welcome back John Hindhaugh to the IMSA Radio broadcast. We have one more marker for points in this motor race and the last marker should be at 18 hours, or at the end of the race. I think it's 18 hours. Not too sure. A brake change just occurred for the #14 AVS Lexus RC F GT3. On the #12 car, according to Townsend Bell, there was some damage and the team is in the garage, working on the car right now. The cold conditions make driving so treacherous on new tires. It's like driving or skating on ice.
Minimum drive time is a big deal. Some drivers will be able to finish their allotted drive time while other drivers still have that task. With the small field of 38 cars, and even less than that now, the traffic isn't quite the bugaboo it used to be in this race, but it's still prevalent. Recall, as mentioned before in earlier hours, it used to be that the Rolex 24 had massive grids of anywhere from 60-80 cars on the road at one time or another. So, traffic was a bloody nightmare. Now, that's less of a problem, but cars can't just vaporize by pushing a disappear button of course. No Hollywood movie trickery of the smokescreen or the oil slick here, thank goodness, well, unless you are driving along and some unlucky chap has the motor go bang right in front of you, but even that is not likely because these cars are so reliable nowadays.
Get the tires warmed up, according to AVS Lexus' Townsend Bell. Meantime, Dries Vanthoor has just eaten up Spencer Pumpelly and this is the classic case of the minnow, being swallowed whole, by the shark, even though the Audi and the Lamborghini have an identical lump in the back with the 5.2 liter V10 motor. Again, to emphasize, in British English and motoring terms, the lump is the engine. Dries Vanthoor is cooking with Cajun pepper sauce right now, making the move stick off turn six and through speedway turns one and two. Patrick Long in the #16 Wright Motorsports Porsche has also gone into second spot in class in GTD. The running order in class is being shaken up as we speak.
Jeff Westphal in the #63 WeatherTech Ferrari is next in line, followed by the #96 Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3, Dillon Machavern currently driving. The BMW and Porsche are still glued together as they move past the #86 MSR Acura NSX GT3 with Jules Gounon at the wheel now. Back onto the high banks they go as Matthieu Jaminet disappears into the darkness, a darkness that will soon, gradually give way to dawn and the sun shall begin to rise over the Atlantic. It's 4:40 A.M. We're at the end of another racing hour. The next hour of racing, is coming up, ladies and gentlemen. Good morning to you all, around the world.
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