2007 24 Hours of Daytona

The 2007 Rolex 24 At Daytona was a Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series 24-hour endurance sports car race held on January 27–28, 2007 at the Daytona International Speedway road course. The overall winner of the race was the Chip Ganassi/Felix Sabates-owned #01 car, a Lexus-powered Riley MkXI, driven by Juan Pablo Montoya, Salvador Durán and Scott Pruett. The GT class was won by the #22 Alegra Motorsports/Fiorano Racing Porsche GT3 Cup car driven by Driver/Owner Carlos de Quesada, Jean-François Dumoulin, Scooter Gabel and Porsche factory driver Marc Basseng.[1]

Prelude

GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing driver Alex Gurney took the pole, his fourth in Rolex Series competition, with a lap of 1:43.475 at an average speed of 123.856 mph (199.327 km/h).

Race

At the green flag, which fell just past 1:30 p.m. Eastern time, Gurney jumped into the lead and the field made its way around the first lap cleanly. But after only seven laps of the 24-hour race, Gurney crashed into the back of a slower GT car which had lost its hood and unexpectedly slowed dramatically. The team would make repairs, but Gurney's GAINSCO Auto Insurance-sponsored Pontiac-powered Riley, which was co-driven by Jon Fogarty and Jimmy Vasser, would never again be in contention for the win.

On January 28, an early-morning wreck of the #82 Porsche GT3 Cup, driven by Chris Pallis, damaged part of the outer retaining wall, causing the race stewards to display the red flag for only the third time in the history of the 24 Hours of Daytona, temporarily suspending the race while repairs took place.[2] An exciting battle took place between three different teams with a diverse group of drivers. The DP class fight was between eventual winner Telmex Chip Ganassi Racing's Juan Pablo Montoya and Scott Pruett, SunTrust Racing's Max Angelelli and SAMAX Motorsport's Patrick Carpentier. Polesitter Alex Gurney's hopes for victory were dashed when his GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing Pontiac Riley was damaged in a first-hour accident.

1,000,000th lap

At 11:11am on the morning of January 28, British-born female Champ Car driver Katherine Legge made history by completing the one millionth lap of the Rolex Daytona 24 hour race, since its inception. Legge, driving the #84 Robinson Racing Pontiac-powered Riley DP car, passed the finish line with less than 2 and a half hours left in the race, completing the 30,419th lap of the 2007 running of the race. Legge was lying in the 31st position at the time.[3][4]

Juan Pablo Montoya became the first racer in history to have won a Formula One race, the Indianapolis 500, a Champ Car title, and the 24 Hours of Daytona. Mario Andretti also won a Formula One race, a Champ Car title and an endurance sports car race at Daytona, but Andretti's victory came in the 1972 event alongside co-driver Jacky Ickx in a six-hour event.

Race results

Note: class winners in bold.

Pos Class No Team Drivers Car Laps
1 DP 01 Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates United States Scott Pruett
Mexico Salvador Durán
Colombia Juan Pablo Montoya
Riley-Lexus 668
2 DP 11 SAMAX Canada Patrick Carpentier
United Kingdom Ryan Dalziel
United Kingdom Darren Manning
Venezuela Milka Duno
Riley-Pontiac 668
3 DP 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Italy Max Angelelli
Denmark Jan Magnussen
United States Jeff Gordon
South Africa Wayne Taylor
Riley-Pontiac 666
4 DP 59 Brumos Racing Portugal João Barbosa
United States J. C. France
United States Hurley Haywood
Brazil Roberto Moreno
Riley-Porsche 662
5 DP 61 AIM Autosport Canada David Empringham
United States Brian Friselle
United States Burt Friselle
Canada Mark Wilkins
Riley-Lexus 657
6 DP 7 SAMAX Czech Republic Tomas Enge
United States Chris Festa
San Marino Christian Montanari
United States Kris Szekeres
United States Roger Yasukawa
Riley-Pontiac 655
7 DP 77 Doran Racing United States Memo Gidley
Italy Fabrizio Golllin
Mexico Michel Jourdain Jr.
Spain Oriol Servia
Doran-Ford 655
8 DP 47 TruSpeed Motorsports Germany Timo Bernhard
United States Rob Morgan
United States Charles Morgan
United States B.J. Zacharias
Riley-Porsche 636
9 DP 60 Michael Shank Racing Brazil Hélio Castroneves
United States Sam Hornish Jr.
Brazil Oswaldo Negri
South Africa Mark Patterson
Riley-Lexus 628
10 DP 19 Finlay Motorsports United States Rob Finlay
United States Bobby Labonte
United States Michael DcDoewll
Canada Michael Valiante
Crawford-Ford 627
11 GT 22 Alegra Motorsports Germany Marc Basseng
Mexico Carlos de Quesada
Canada Jean-François Dumoulin
United States Scooter Gabel
Porsche 911 626
12 GT 07 Team Drinkin' Mate United States Kelly Collins
United States Paul Edwards
United Kingdom Andy Pilgrim
Pontiac GXP.R 626
13 GT 64 The Racer's Group Germany Ralf Kelleners
United States Jim Lowe
United States Jim Pace
United States Johannes van Overbreek
Porsche 911 625
14 GT 06 Team Drinkin' Mate United States Tim Lewis Jr.
United States Johnny O'Connell
United States Leighton Reese
Pontiac GXP.R 624
15 GT 70 SpeedSource United Kingdom Nick Ham
United States David Haskell
United States Randy Pobst
Canada Sylvain Tremblay
Mazda RX-8 624

References