Fourth win in 5 years for South African champion owner on team’s debut with new Acura
Wayne Taylor Racing won its fourth Daytona 24 Hour win in five years as the team added a team’s hat trick, when Filipe Albuquerque, Ricky Taylor, Alexander Rossi and Helio Castroneves took its new Konica Minolta Acura ARX-05 to a debut victory in a dramatic final hour.
WAYNE TAYLOR’S SIXTH DAYTONA WIN
East London born former South African driver’s champion Wayne Taylor has now won the Daytona 24 Hour six times. He twice won as a driver in 1996 and 2005, when he was also the US sportscar champion. Wayne also won the LMP1 class in the ’98 Le Mans 24 Hour.
By son Ricky wining, both Wayne’s sons have now also twice won the Daytona 24 twice overall — Ricky won with brother Jordan in 2017, while Jordan also won in 2019 and took the GTLM class in a Corvette on Sunday.
Jimmie Johnson, Kamui Kobayashi, Simon Pagenaud and Mike Rockenfeller’s Action Express Racing Cadillac was second overall behind the WTR Acura, after passing ultimately third placed Oliver Jarvis, Harry Tincknell and Jonathan Bomarito Mazda with four minutes to go.
CADILLAC BLEW A TYRE IN CHASE
The major event however, was three minutes earlier when Renger van der Zande, Kevin Magnussen and Scott Dixon’s Ganassi Cadillac blew a tyre with seven minutes to race after adopting an alternative strategy to try hunt down the leading Taylor machine.
Van der Zande changed only two tyres in his last stop and used the saved time and extra heat in his rubber to pass Ticnknell for second and close right down on leader Albuquerque, but the gamble did not pay off as right-rear puncture sent van der Zande limping the pits to emerge in fifth.
Dwight Merriman, Kyle Tille, Ryan Dalziel and Paul-Loup Chatin’s ORECA won LMP2; Jordan Taylor, Antonio Garcia and Nick Catsburg Corvette C8.R won GTLM and Russell Ward, Philip Ellis, Indy Dontje and Maro Engel won the GTD class in a Mercedes-AMG GT3.
The next round of the 2020 IMSA Weathertech series is another classic – the Twelve Hours of Sebring on 20 March 2020.
