Tom Blomqvist, Colin Braun, Helio Castroneves and Simon Pagenaud have won the 2023 24 Hours of Daytona for #60 Meyer Shank Acura, the second consecutive time the Meyer Shank team has won the United States’ biggest endurance race.
Blomqvist handled the final stint masterfully, keeping his fellow Acura ruival Filipe Albuquerque, plus a brace of Cadillacs, at bay for well over an hour.
Albuquerque finished second in the #10 Wayne Taylor Acura. The Portuguese driver, along with his teammates Ricky Taylor, Brendon Hartley and Louis Deletraz, came back from being 2 laps down half way through the race, but couldn’t quite do enough to overwhelm Meyer Shank.
The two Chip Gansssi-run factory Cadillacs finished third and fourth, #01, with Renger van der Zande in the car in the final podium position. Earl Bamber crossed the line fourth in the #01 Cadillac. Both van der Zande and Bamber, and their teammates, Sebastien Bourdais and Scott Dixon in the #01 and Alex Lynn and Richard Westbrook in the #02, ran reliably all race but didn’t quite have the pace to overwhelm the very strong Acuras.
In fifth was Alexander Sims in the #31 Action Express Cadillac, 12 laps off the finish. Sims and his teammates, Pipo Derani and Jack Aitken, had similar pace to the other two Cadillacs but suspension issues which needed repairing in the garage delayed them.
Sixth was Phillip Eng’s #24 BMW, 16 laps off the winning Acura. The BMWs did not have the pace to truly challenge today, but Eng, along with his teammates Augusto Farfus, Marco Wittmann and Colton Herta, did finish in front of both Porsches.
The #7 Porsche finished 14th overall, 7th in class, with Matt Campbell crossing the line to finish the race. It was delayed by multiple issues in the pits, as did the other Porsche, which was unofficially classified 42nd.
Ninth in GTP was the #25 BMW of Connor De Phillippi, Nick Yelloly, Sheldon van der Linde and Colton Herta. It was delayed early on for more than two hours while hybrid issues related to its MGU was fixed, and eventually finished 48th, 131 laps down.
LMP2 was one by the tightest of margins, 0.016, between James Allen, in the #55 Proton Competition Oreca and Ben Hanley, behind the wheel of the 04 Crowdstrike APR Oreca. Both drivers, as well as their co-drivers – Fred Poordad, Francesco Pizzi, and Gianmaria Bruni in the #55 and George Kurtz, Matt McMurry, and Esteban Guitterz had battled long and hard throught the race, but Allen prevailed in the #55 Oreca, by passing Hanley on the tri-oval as they approached the line for the final time.
Third in LMP2, was Nicklas Nielsen, and co-drivers Francois Perrodo, Matthieu Vaxiviere and Julien Canal, in the #88 AF Corse Oreca, just over 5 seconds behind Allen and Hanley, who crossed the line a fraction of a second apart.
Keyword: Meyer Shank Acura wins Daytona 24 for second time in a row