Grand-Am, Roar Before The Rolex 24 At Daytona – Friday/Saturday Notes
Team Sahlen Off To An Impressive Start

The 2013 racing year kicked off at a warm Daytona International Speedway on Friday as the three-day Roar Before the Rolex 24 test got underway. 57 cars were on the entry list - and we will endeavour to identify as many of the ‘TBA’s as soon as possible - with 54 participating in at least one of the half-dozen sessions that took place over the first two days (Sunday sees two final sessions).

Things got off to a quiet start after rain in the morning, but the second session on Friday saw times start to quickly come down as the track dried out. Defending Rolex 24 winner AJ Allmendinger set the fastest time in the 150-minute afternoon session, with a 1:42.918 in the #60 Michael Shank Racing Riley Ford DP; “The track was a little damp,” said the 31 year old. “The race line, for the most part, was dry, but if you put a wheel wrong, especially early in the session, and got onto the wet, you had a chance to wreck the race car. There’s no need for that in the first 30 or 40 minutes into a test. It’s just about patience.”

Team Owner Michael Shank also chose the test to announce his driver lineups for the Rolex 24, with last year’s winning lineup of Allmendinger, Ozz Negri, John Pew and Justin Wilson reuniting in the #60 (Marcus Ambrose is testing this weekend and may deputise for Negri if the Brazilian racer isn’t fully fit after incurring a leg-injury recently), while the second – and now third-generation – DP, #6, will see Gustavo Yacaman and Jorge Goncalvez return and be joined by Michael Valiante and Chris Cummings.

“I’m very proud of this driver line-up and I think we have another good opportunity to do well - with both of these cars,” said Shank. “I’m thrilled to welcome back Michael to the team as well as Chris Cummings. They both tested with us in December and they did a great job. We’ll just focus on the same things that were successful for us last year. I want to win every year. To repeat would be an oddity because I think it would be very difficult to do but we have very strong cars. Our drivers know us really well. Almost all of my drivers have been with me for a long time now. We have what we think is the right combination to win the race, we just need to stay out of trouble. We have as good of a shot -or better- than a lot of people.”

The two Chip Ganassi Riley BMWs were second and third quickest on Friday, also coming in below the 1:43 marker, while the #6 MSR DP was fourth quickest.

Andy Lally set the fastest GT time of Friday, with a 1:49.322 in the #44 Magnus Racing Porsche, just a hundredth of a second quicker than Marco Holzer’s best in the #23 Alex Job Racing Porsche.

The #32 Konrad Motorsport Porsche was third quickest, making it a thoroughly satisfactory day for Stuttgart.

And the good news for Zuffenhausen continued as the GX class was headed by the #16 Napleton Racing Cayman, courtesy of a 1:57.466 from 2009 overall winner David Donohue. Dr Jim Norman, Nelson Canache and Shane Lewis will complete the Napleton lineup for the race itself.

“I wanted a place where we can exercise our craft, have some success and could really enjoy the company and grow together as team,” said Donohue, on his move to his new team. “I did one race for Napleton at Monterey in a Cayman during the most recent Rennsport Reunion and I had the most fun driving there in probably a decade. It was just a hoot to drive the car.”

Saturday saw three daylight sessions and one night practice and ended with something of a surprise – Team Sahlen topping the times.

“We’ve got a lot of catching up to do, because many of the DP teams have in years of experience what we have in days,” said Dane Cameron, whose 1:42.101 in the #42 Riley BMW in the morning session wasn’t bettered.

“Today is our eighth day with the car, and we’re still learning. We’re working on a few science projects here and there, and seeing what works.” Clearly something is working very well, although Cameron’s time is almost a second slower than the fastest DP time of the corresponding 2012 test, suggesting that Sunday’s sessions could see further improvements in pace from the top class if conditions are favourable.

Michael Valiante took the #6 MSR DP up to second in the combined times after a 1:42.160, while an improvement from Allmendinger kept the #60 ahead of the two Ganassi Rileys; Juan Pablo Montoya’s 1:42.463 leaving the #01 just ahead of the #02.

Just 1.2 seconds covered the top 14 prototypes after six sessions, with the #2 Starworks Riley Ford in sixth. Enzo Potolicchio’s ‘breakaway’ team, 8 Star Motorsports, was 11th with a quickest time of 1:43.084 for the #3 Corvette DP.

Doran Racing’s #77 Dallara Ford was eighth after a 1:42.780 from Paul Tracy on Saturday morning. That this was quicker than the car’s qualifying time from 2012 was certainly encouraging for the team, all the more so given that it is still running in DP2G spec. How much more pace will the upgraded third-generation bodywork deliver when it debuts later this month?

“The highlight for today was not having any rain,” said Tracy's teammate Jim Lowe. “Paul, Jon and I had three good sessions, each of us getting a lot of time running the car. We had sun today which made the track a bit greasy by the afternoon so everyone had slower times by then, but it sure beats the rain we had yesterday. The car continues to be nice and quick without having to make any changes to the setup since yesterday. Paul set a great lap in the morning session and finished seventh again, and Jon has been consistent, taking little bites as he approaches the sharp end of things. It was a classic test day with everything working the way you want it. Unfortunately we might see rain again for our final day on Sunday, so we will have to be flexible with our schedule.”

The Roar was also the backdrop to Wayne Taylor Racing’s unveiling of its new livery, featuring Velocity Worldwide as the title sponsor.

Single-seater ace Ryan Hunter-Reay will be joining Max Angelelli and Jordan Taylor for the Rolex 24, making this a very strong package for the race; “I’ve always been a fan of Ryan’s,” said Wayne Taylor. “We drove together with Max at Salt Lake City in 2006. I’ve known Ryan for years and have always thought he was a tremendously underrated driver. He proved to the world what he’s truly made of by winning the IndyCar championship last season. It’s very important for our mutual partner General Motors to have him with a top team in the Daytona 24-hour. It all came together really well and I’m very excited about having him co-drive with Max and Jordan. I think it’s going to be really good.”

GT remained a Porsche playground on Saturday, although Pat Long managed to set himself apart from a very impressive pack by setting a 1:48.569 in the #73 Park Place Motorsports GT3 to go a mighty half-second quicker than his nearest challenger, Michael Christensen in the #32 Konrad Porsche.

To put Long’s lap (which was also quicker than the fastest 2012 GT test time by two-thirds of a second) into context, 18 cars were within a second of Christensen’s time.

The four Audi R8s all figured prominently – fourth, sixth, eighth and 13th quickest....

....but you had to go to ninth to find the first non-German car, the #69 Aim Autosport Ferrari. The #57 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro was second-quickest in Saturday’s third session, but Robin Liddell’s 1:49.588 was only 12th fastest in the combined times and a second off Long’s best.

The GX class saw an improvement for the Napleton Porsche, with Shane Lewis improving on Donohue’s time with a 1:56.167. Only three of the six GX cars on the entry list set a time during the first two days; the #38 BGB Motorsports Cayman finishing with a best of 1:56.529, while the brand-new #70 SpeedSource Mazda6 was still clearly in the very early stages of its set-up programme as demonstrated by a best time of 2:05.425.

The lineups for the three Mazda6 GXs, meanwhile, have been confirmed as:

#70 SpeedSource: Jonathan Bomarito, Marino Franchitti, James Hinchcliffe, Tom Long and Sylvain Tremblay. 
#00 VISIT FLORIDA Racing/SpeedSource/Yellow Dragon: Joel Miller, Tristan Nunez, Spencer Pigot, Yojiro Terada, and Tristan Vautier. 
#25 Freedom Autosport: Andrew Carbonell, Tom Long, Rhett O’Doski, and Derek Whitis.

We’ll have a further round up after the test concludes.