For the second year in a row, Meyer Shank Racing scored the overall victory in the 61st running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway.
Wheeling the No. 60 Acura ARX-06 for the final two hours around the 3.56-mile road course in the GTP class, Tom Blomqvist anchored MSR’s bid to a second consecutive Rolex timepiece.
“That was crazy,” Blomqvist said. “I knew we had a fantastic car. I’ve been working hard. Unbelievable. Massive, well done, everyone being part of this project and worked together on this project. What a car we’ve built.
“I was just a bit nervous. The 10 was definitely second fastest car, but we held them off.”
With the win, Blomqvist’s co-driver Helio Castroneves made history as only the second driver to score three Rolex 24 victories in a row.
“Can you believe that?” Castroneves said. “Big props to everyone. Everyone did an amazing job. Everybody worked so hard together. We got it! Another one. I can’t believe it. This is absolutely a dream come true.”
2019 Indianapolis 500 winner Simon Pagenaud earned his second Rolex with the team, with long-time sports car driver Colin Braun notching his first overall triumph.
The season-opening event for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship marked the first race for the hybrid-powered GTP class.
MSR’s No. 60 was the team to beat all weekend, after scoring the pole in the Roar Before The Rolex 24 last week.
A mere 4.19 seconds behind the dominant Acura was the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport entry driven by Filipe Albuquerque, Ricky Taylor, Louis Delétraz and Brendon Hartley.
After 24 hours and 761 laps, the margin of victory in the LMP2 class came down to .01 seconds with James Allen driving the No. 55 Proton Competition Oreca past the race-leading CrowdStrike Racing machine of Ben Hanley in a drag race to the checkered flag on the 3.56-mile road course.
Allen prevailed in a photo finish.
Allen shared the winning car with Fred Poordad, Francesco Pizzi and Gianmaria Bruni.
“It was amazing,” Allen said. “We had quite a gap going into the last couple laps but Ben had some bad luck with traffic. Going into the last lap I knew I could just get him on the straight and that’s what I did. It’s amazing. The car was destroyed on Thursday and the team did a good job getting it back together.”
Meanwhile the CrowdStrike team in its first Rolex 24 came up mere feet short of the victory with Hanley sharing the car with George Kurtz, Matt McMurry and Esteban Gutierrez.
The AWA Duqueine No. 17 claimed victory in the LMP3 class victory with Wayne Boyd sharing the winning car with Anthony Mantella, Nico Varrone and Thomas Merrill.
In the GT categories, the two winning cars completed an identical 729 laps with the GTD winning Aston Martin Vantage GT3 taking the checkered flag just ahead of the GTD Pro winning Mercedes AMG GT3, with the two cars placing 15th and 16th overall.
The GTD winning No. 27 Aston Martin was wheeled to the finish by Marco Sorensen, who shared the wheel with Roman De Angelis, Ian James and Darren Turner. Aston Martin also finished second in the class with Nicki Thiim, John Potter, Andy Lally and Spencer Pumpelly in the No. 44 machine.
Maro Engel co-drove the WeatherTech Racing Mercedes AMG GT3 to the GTD Pro triumph with co-drivers Cooper MacNeil, Daniel Juncadella and Jules Gounon.
The Corvette Racing C8.R finished second in GTD with Antonio Garcia, Jordan Taylor and Tommy Milner at the wheel.
Keyword: MSR Goes Back-To-Back In Rolex 24 At Daytona