Good morning everyone. It is almost 7:00 A.M. Eastern Time. The sun will rise over the Atlantic Ocean and Daytona International Speedway soon. Yours truly is now following the race and just waking up, preparing to head to the speedway for the race finish a little later on. We've still go just under seven hours to go. The #10 Cadillac with Renger van der Zande has now run 595 laps, 2,118 miles. Cadillac's also run second and third with the #5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac of Loic Duval second, and the #31 Whelen Action Express Racing Cadillac in third, currently with Felipe Nasr at the wheel of it. Again, this is the car yours truly is paying particular attention to and that story has been well documented throughout this Rolex 24.
The predicted lap number has gone up to 840. It was down to 832-835 earlier, but we are on pace for a distance record in the Rolex 24 in 2020. How about that! Now, we see an extraordinary dark blue sky as the sun is just beginning to come up. We could be getting those Gulf Racing blue and orange colors towards the coastline. Pit stop time for the #31 Cadillac. Good morning everyone. Felipe Nasr has handed the car to Pipo Derani. Make sure to get the right shoulder belt over the seat bolster to save time and bish bash bosh, he did it. That was a swift turn around. Renger van der Zande moves past the #96 Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3, the Liqui Moly liveried car. Bobby Rahal is a busy bloke this weekend, with the Road Racing Driver's Club, and also looking after his team with the BMW M8 GTE's. Rahal says "there's a long way to go yet and we hope the #24 car which has been a good car, can run hard and keep going. There's a long way to go yet. Keep her going and we'll race in the last two hours. We'll get there and see what we've got."
Rahal says as a team owner, "I have a lot of great people working with me, a great team, with great drivers. I am proud of everyone. When the sun comes up, everyone's energy comes up with it. I am pleased with what we've got and we have to keep going." Rahal is asked about how GT racing's future looks as we've been talking so much about Prototype convergence. Rahal says, "the GTLM class is really tough with great brands and great teams, and close competition. The convergence announcement is very exciting. We are not sure where we'll be in a couple years. Right now GTLM is our focus. Let's worry about now and the other stuff will take care of itself." Rahal also says, "racing has been my life. My dad's been a part of it, and it's been my life as a fan, a driver, and a team owner. I can't imagine doing anything else. I never get tired of it. The challenge of winning keeps me going."
Surely, any team owner would echo these sentiments. When motor racing gets into your blood, it stays there. It never leaves you and can become an all consuming passion, especially a form of racing like sports car racing. Rahal has spent 61 years of his life enjoying racing. It gets into you when you're young and never leaves you. Simon Pagenaud completes his 595th lap. We've got two Acura's still in the race. Neither is in the best of shape, driving like pogo sticks because of the porpoising. Dane Cameron admitted it was terrible to be at the wheel with the porpoising. The #9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R is finally back in the race after a couple hours of repairs including an hour and a half in the pit lane alone. Dennis Olsen brought the car in and now, Zacharie Robichon, the Canadian, is back at the wheel of it.
That's gutting for those chaps. They were having a great race up until their troubles hit. Simon Pagenaud went wide into the corner, taking a window seat on the aircraft. It's getting brighter and brighter, but not having too much of an effect on the ambient light. The layer of cloud is reflecting bright red orange light off in the distance. Just incredible. Simon Pagenaud is now coming up on Jesse Krohn in BMW #24. He stayed in the car after the brake change. The leader is in the pit lane now as well, having turned 602 laps, 2,143 miles. 840 laps is the prediction. At Pfaff Motorsports, the driveshaft went out on the car and that's why it took an hour and a half to fix the car.
In the 24 Hours of Circuit of the Americas last year, run by a different championship, there were a boatload of Porsche driveshafts giving up the ghost. There must have been a faulty batch in the race at COTA for a different championship, with Cup series cars, the 911 Gen. 2 Cup cars. There was planned maintenance in that particular race. That different championship is called the 24 Hour Series, for a series called Creventic which is from Holland. One of their drivers, Rik Breukers, could have been here, but he might be running a different brand than the others. Rik Breukers has won this race before. Rolex watches as earrings? Deary me, John! I don't think that'll work, mate. Leave that one on the bench, daddy-o.
We've got just about six and a quarter hours to go. In 45 minutes we'll have the standard length of a World Endurance race. Also, we did have on Friday, the Michelin Pilot Challenge event here at Daytona and when we get to four hours (in a couple hours' time), we'll have that race length to go. Yours truly is looking forward to finding the time to cover that event as well. Wowzers! Would you look at that sunrise! Orange, gold, and purple, blanket the Floridian skies over Daytona International Speedway on this Sunday morning. Just amazing! Renger van der Zande is staying with his stint. He's going for it. With the low level cloud layer, the sunrise reflects amazingly over the Atlantic. Official sunrise in about 15 minutes.
This is a great time in an endurance race. Florida is called the sunshine state for a reason. It'll be dry to the checkered flag and we've still only had three Full Course Yellows. You need a bit of cloud cover for a good looking sunrise. Madison Snow and Mirko Bortolotti pit in GTD. Snow had a clean entry, and Bortolotti is at a slight angle behind a prototype. Madison Snow has a clean, 40 second pit stop and is back on track while Bortolotti is still being serviced by his pit crew. Again, depending on compounds, you can only have 38 sets of tires in total. It's presumed you don't have to have full sets. Kyle Busch is prepping for another stint aboard the #14 AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus we've been watching, still in tenth place in class with Jack Hawksworth at the keyboard.
The sunlight has now pierced the gloom here at Daytona. We've seen the Dubai 24 Hours, and we are seeing the Rolex 24. But, there's loads more sports car racing to come here on Endurance... The Sports Car Racing Blog. We have the Bathurst 12 Hours from Australia to cover, and then, in March it will be time for "Super Sebring" featuring both the IMSA series and the FIA World Endurance Championship. Indeed the #14 Lexus is in the lane, with loads of crud all over that car. Crud and tire clag everywhere. But Kyle Busch has a clean pit stop and is back on his way to go drive another stint.
Hawksworth is from Collingworth, Yorkshire, England. Kyle Busch has a dark visor on his hlmet driving into the sunrise. He'll use that as a sun visor. It's a medium gray tinted visor as the #4 Corvette C8.R is back on track? Yes. You're right! It's not game over for the #4. Yours truly thought that car was out of the motor race. Kyle Busch has raced at night in NASCAR races, but he's not done the 24 hour. This is his first time racing into the sunrise. The #912 Porsche has made a pit stop, a scheduled stop. The #4 Corvette was in the garage for seven hours and 50 minutes. Holy mackerel! Kyle Busch has let the #4 silver and yellow Corvette by.
That team has done a monumental amount of work on the car. Wow. Someone is turning up the dimmer switch and we've got the Tuscan orange and the Sky blue. BMW #24 has pitted. Plenty of people down on the beach will be thinking the same. We are very close to the coastline. Last year, it rained the whole time. We've got ten minutes to go before official sunrise and it'll be a real bear to see the timing and scoring and trying to see the screen. Kyle Busch has indeed been lapped once again by Renger van der Zande who has run 611 laps, 2,175 miles. van der Zande leads by a minute and 20 seconds while a standard lap time around Daytona is, oh, a minute and 36 seconds or so.
He'll put another lap on Loic Duval in the #5 Cadillac, soon. An hour ago, the ambient temp was 44 degrees Fahrenheit with the track temp at 47 degrees Fahrenheit. Thank you, Michelin's John Love, and also, Mr. John Hindhaugh, for that info. In some series' the officials won't start a track session if the combined track temps don't exceed 100 degrees. At 6AM it was too cold to start a race or a qualifying session for the IndyCars. Holy smokes! The sports car guys are one tough, rugged bunch, as we see Tristan Nunez pit the #77 Mazda DPi.
Jack Hawksworth is from Collingworth, now Brackford, England. These towns are within Yorkshire, England and I hear there are good driving roads there. The driveshaft failures for the Porsche Cup cars at COTA were due to the bumps, snapping the road spec retaining bolts for the Porsche Cup cars, run in a different championship (i.e. the Creventic series). They will be racing at Monza, rather than Mugello in Italy this year. IMSA Communications Director, Greg Elkin has a stat. From lap 92 to 337 in 2018, was the record for the longest green flag stint in the Rolex 24 and we've broken it! We've had the longest green flag stint in history at the Rolex! Kudos to the drivers! You all have done fabulously!
We've got 841 laps predicted. We're breaking new territory for therecords here at Daytona. Absolutely amazing! Kyle Busch always wants to learn, and he does not believe he is at the peak of his career. True champions do think this way. Motorsport is a distillation of life. I write about a lot of racing, and I have seen a lot of things on TV. This is the first time I have encountered the Rolex 24 in person. Motor racing is indeed one of the most unpredictable sports on the whole face of the planet. It's not like stick and ball sports at all, as we have ended the 13 hours and 21 minutes of darkness. Get your Vitamin D, folks. Pit stop time here for the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Oreca LMP2 car. Ben Keating is back in that car.
Andy Lally is also at the controls once again of the #44 Magnus Racing Flex Box (nee Flexi Box) Lamborghini. On pit lane, major repairs for the #52 with bodywork off the front and rear of the automobile. The rear diffuser and the wing mount are being replaced and the same with the front clip. They are working on this on the pit lane instead of in the garage. There's aluminum swath everywhere. By swath, I mean (again piggybacking on Mr. Hindhaugh's observations), a scythed out hunk of aluminum from someplace. It was caught behind the wheel and the wheel has been machined. Colin Braun leads LMP2 aboard the #81 DragonSpeed USA car. Braun has run 600 laps, 2,136 miles, or well, the car has.
He's just 20 laps away from DPi and overall leader Renger van der Zande. Why is the aluminum swath all over the hub? It has to be due to contact with another car. The rear bodywork is still off the vehicle. There was a pit stop for one of the Acura's, presumably the #6 car. Corvette #4 is back in the motor race, but was stopped for eight hours almost due to the bell housing having cracked in the transmission. There was a hairline crack in the bell housing, the casing. It wasn't engine oil. It was gearbox oil, and Corvette is partnered with Mobil 1 for their oiling and lubricant needs that are thin and feel like water but still protect the metal parts in the engine. The thicker the viscosity, the more power you lose and so oil companies engineer at a molecular level.
Pipo Derani in and out of the lane in the #31 Whelen Cadillac. Again, yours truly is following this team and has an interest in what they are doing. Currently, they are third in the overall. I shall report more fully on their individual race in a future post. New boots on the #31 and Pipo Derani stays at the wheel. Porsche are running 1-2 in GTLM and Nick Tandy has worked his way back towards the sister car, now in the hands of Earl Bamber. Jordan Taylor in the #3 Corvette is 23 seconds behind Nick Tandy followed by Augusto Farfus in the #24 BMW M8 GTE which had it's front brakes changed earlier on before dawn broke. Jesse Krohn, the previous driver in the car knew they were having a braking problem.
The BMW has to run at a heavier weight than does the Porsche. Seven different cars have led this motor race except for the #7 Acura, now with Helio Castroneves in the lane. The PR1/Mathiasen car is back out, and was getting the rear tow link fixed. Something was knocked askew on the rear suspension. They may have thudded the wall with the car. Both ends of the automobile have been repaired and he's on cold tires, new tires. They didn't need extra hands on the car and so they could fix it in the lane and didn't need to go to the garage. Kyle Tilley is next up in the #18 Era Motorsports Oreca LMP2 car.
We have the sunrise and in just a few minutes the sun will go behind a cloud for a while. Cadillac #5 in the lane from second with Loic Duval at the controls. Fuel, and no tires. The car stalls briefly. Maybe there was another air hose for one of the rattle guns getting in the way. The Porsche is heavier than the BMW by 60 kilograms. Porsche were given an extra ten kilograms in BoP between the Roar test and the race. Colin Braun pits from the lead in LMP2. Ben Keating though, he's having no luck as also his other car, the #74 Mercedes Benz AMG GT3 has stopped in the pit lane. We need four mechanics to get the car to the pit lane.
Get to the box, push the car to the land and get cracking on working on it. The crew members (four mechanics) push the car. Renger van der Zande is in the lane after a 22 lap stint. Thankfully he didn't make contact with the #74 Mercedes, pitted right ahead of the race leader. A full service pit stop for #10 and a new driver. That was an amazingly quick stop for #10! Yikes! They have one tire changer on the front rattle gun and one on the rear. Lexus RC F GT3, #12 is also in the lane. Fuel fill is the controlling factor. No time lost for the car. AVS has a good stop for the #12 as well. Mercedes #74 is also in the lane as we've explained.
They've got a transmission issue. The car won't go into neutral and get out of gear. Felipe Fraga has a total electrical system shutdown on the car. You cannot know where to trace the trouble because of all the wiring in these modern race cars. They had no radio communication either. Get to the root of the issue to minimize time in the lane. Check the master switches on the dash. Get a spare steering wheel. Six minutes to go before the last quarter of this race. We watch scenes from Daytona Beach Airport as we get closer to 8AM. Ryan Briscoe is now at the wheel of the #10 Cadillac. Renger van der Zande is amazed at how bulletproof the #10 Cadillac has been.
Uh oh. Trouble for the #31 Whelen Cadillac. We've got a whole distance of the Six Hours of Watkins Glen left to go. The #31 Cadillac runs fifth in the overall at this point. He is trundling 'round on the apron of the race track with a damaged tire? Yes. Pipo Derani has a flat left rear tire. Derani has made it to the lane and is having the tire change done. He will have to recover. Meanwhile, a battle between the GTD Lexus and the GTLM Corvette, car #3. Six hours to go, just about. We're headed for the final quarter of this motor race here at the 58th running of the Rolex 24. We've had not even an hour of yellow flag. Just 56 minutes. We're working 630 laps (2,243 miles). We have had 250+ laps of green flag running. There's fewer cars in the race this year, but no one is left stranded on the road. The #31 car in and out. Pipo Derani remains at the wheel of it.
There's also been a penalty called for the #10 Cadillac? It was the #10 that came down pit lane and it looked like a scheduled pit stop as opposed to a drive through penalty. This is a bit of confusion at the moment. What's the matter?
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