Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti has used strategy to take the lead after an incident-filled first hour of the 62nd hour Rolex 24 at Daytona with the #10 Acura ARX-06 of Ricky Taylor leading the #01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R of Sebastien Bourdais.
Felipe Nasr runs third in the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963 ahead of the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac of Pipo Derani.
George Kurtz currently leads the LMP2 class aboard the #04 CrowdStrike Racing by APR ORECA 07, followed by Nico Pino in the #2 United Autosports USA ORECA, and Pietro Fittipaldi in the #52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA. Fittipaldi took over from Nick Boulle who led for most of his first stint at the wheel.
In GTD Pro, Andrea Caldarelli in the #19 Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2 has inherited the lead after the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 was collected in an incident while leading the class.
Oliver Jarvis runs second in the #9 Pfaff Motorsports McLaren 720S GT3 EVO and Antonio Garcia is third in the #3 Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R.
Aaron Telitz leads in GTD aboard the surviving #12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus, ahead of a suprisingly strong Manny Franco in the #34 Conquest Racing Ferrari 296 GT3, and Adam Christodolou in the #80 Lone Star Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3.
Under mostly sunny skies on a warm January day in Daytona, polesitter and track record holder Derani hit the front in his red #31 Cadillac, while his countryman Felipe Nasr in the #7 Porsche jumped past Bourdais into second for a few minutes – before Bourdais moved past him into turn one to retake second.
It wasn’t a dream start for one of the new AWA Corvettes. Orey Fidani had to start the #13 Corvette from the pit lane and went behind the wall after 25 minutes. What was first suspected to be a fuel pump problem has turned out to be a power steering issue that has kept Fidani behind the wall.
And soon after the black and gold ‘Vette went behind the wall, the first Full Course Yellow was deployed. Misha Goikhberg lost control of his #78 Forte Racing Lamborghini at the entry to the Le Mans Chicane, and hit the tyre barriers. Goikhberg walked away from the crash unhurt and was quickly evaluated and released from the Infield Care Centre.
“I made a mistake,” Goikhberg admitted. “We aren’t fast enough and I pushed too hard trying to make up time in the Bus Stop and made an error. The damage isn’t too bad but we have lost way too many laps at this point.”
Pit stops came and went with the blue and black #10 WTRAndretti Acura ARX-06 of Ricky Taylor jumping to the front, but two separate accidents brought out another Full Course Yellow.
LMP2 gentleman drivers Steven Thomas, Dwight Merriman, and PJ Hyett all spun off at the Le Mans Chicane in an incident that began when Thomas spun Hyett, with Merriman joining them in sympathy. They got back underway with no trouble.
The second incident was quite scary, as Dennis Andersen spun out in front of Mike Conway – the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus of Conway had nowhere to go but straight into the #20 MDK/High Class Racing Oreca, and both cars suffered significant damage.
“There was absolutely nothing Mike could do,” said Conway’s co-driver Ben Barnicoat. “The LMP2 spun right in front of him, nowhere to go. We’re absolutely gutted – the car was super, super strong.”
But all drivers were able to walk away unhurt.
Images © Jack Webster, Graham Goodwin / Dailysportscar
