Three hours remain in the 62nd annual Rolex 24 at Daytona, where the contenders in overall and class honours have crystallised.
Leading the way overall and in GTP is still the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963 driven by Matt Campbell. He has an eight second lead over Jack Aitken in the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac V-Series.R.
But on the other side of the Penske Porsche camp, Kevin Estre has dropped to the tail end of the lead lap after he left the pits less than 45 minutes ago, locked up into the International Horseshoe (turn three) on cold tyres, then couldn’t find the reverse gear quick enough. Estre dropped from third to sixth place.
The red and black #40 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Acura ARX-06 of Colton Herta has been plugging along and took over third place after Estre’s off. And Alessio Picariello is continuing the #5 Proton Competition Porsche’s strong run in fourth.
Era Motorsport and CrowdStrike Racing by APR are the main contenders in LMP2. The #18 Era Motorsport ORECA 07 of currently leads, and Connor Zilisch has returned to the cockpit – but the #04 CrowdStrike Racing by APR ORECA of Malthe Jakobsen in second pitted ten minutes prior.
As that evolves, the #52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA, now driven by Pietro Fittipaldi, runs a distant third in class.
GTD and GTD Pro gave us great action in the last hour, but the tables have turned somewhat after an incident across classes to begin this hour of racing.
While racing together, the #023 Triarsi Competizione Ferrari 296 GT3 of Onofrio Triarsi Jnr was turned around by the #1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 of Neil Verhagen. Triarsi dropped to third in GTD while Verhagen fell further in arrears of the #62 Risi Competizione Ferrari. Verhagen was given a warning for incident responsibility.
From one Le Mans winner to another, Alessandro Pier Guidi is now in the #62 Risi Ferrari and has a ten second class lead over the #1 BMW, now driven by Sheldon van der Linde.
There’s just over a minute back to the third-place #77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R, currently driven by Laurin Heinrich, the last car on the lead lap in GTD Pro.
The #57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 and #12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 are separated by just over 13 seconds now – as Philip Ellis in the Mercedes leads Aaron Telitz in the Lexus. Meanwhile, Triarsi has ceded third place to the #32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes of Mike Skeen.
There’s just one standard IMSA sprint race’s worth of time left to go!
Feature image © Jack Webster / Dailysportscar.com
