Breakin’ It Down, IMSA-style: The 2024 Rolex 23.99 Goes To Porsche (Twice)

There's a certain irony that the checkered flag was thrown early in a race sponsored by one of the most prestigious watch companies in the world

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- In what was a wacky finish to the Rolex 24, bringing out the checkered flag with still over two minutes left on the clock, the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsports, featuring Felipe Nasr in the final stint, was able to hold off a charging Tom Blomqvist in the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac to take overall and GTP wins at Daytona.

Joining Nasr for his overall efforts were Dane Cameron, Matt Campbell, and reigning Indy 500 champion Josef Newgarden, all of whom are first-time overall champions in the Rolex 24.

It wasn’t the easiest road for the Porsche Penskes, doing battle against a tandem of Cadillacs. However, an early morning retirement for the #01 Cadillac Racing entry gave Porsche the strength in numbers given to win, even translating down to its customer teams with Proton and JDC-Miller.

For the #7 Porsche Penske, while minor mistakes happened, the team stayed consistent, practically clean, and drove the car smartly amongst all four stars.

For Porsche, it was the first victory at Daytona since 2003, while Ferrari won its first manufacturer Rolex 24 since 1998.

The Captain -- Mr. Penske, of course -- was also able to get his first Rolex win since 1969 himself, capping off what was a great opening start to the season for a team that found some trouble at Petit Le Mans to wrap up last season.

Obviously on a weekend such as this, history is always the talk of the town. But with so much leading up to these last two weeks (including last weekend's Roar Before the 24) such as the records that could be broken by the Brad Pitt-F1 motion flick, there has never been more excitement leading up to an IMSA opener than this.

(Video courtesy Logan Butler)

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Porsche Power

The weekend really was all about the Porsches.

All four Porsche entries (including customer teams) found some sort of success this weekend, which brought a lot of excitement for what’s to come for the German-based brand.

Both the #6 and #7 Penske Porsches picked up right where they left off in 2023 and ran consistently throughout the weekend, something that can’t be said for all three manufacturers.

Outside of the major incident with the #5 Proton Mustang Sampling Porsche happening two weeks ago at the Roar, all four Porsches stayed out of the garage for the entirety of the weekend and brought sustained durability, which explains more than meets the eye.

Being the brand that holds the most LMDh/LMh entries amongst both IMSA and WEC, Porsche has an advantage in its development and continues to grow its hybrid entries. Not to mention the support that Roger Penske has added to the Porsche Penske greatly helped make a weekend like this come about.

Both Porsche Penskes went out there and played it smart in a race that caused problems, and that translated to the drivers behind the wheel.

Felipe Nasr did an incredible wheel job to be able to avoid incoming traffic and bring The Captain his first Rolex 24 winner's watch in decades.

Now it will be about seeing more success to come for the Red, White, and Black liveried Porsche Penskes and its sister teams.

The Wayne Taylor Blues

In a weekend that saw a lot of promise for the known Daytona world champions, things didn’t go smoothly for Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti.

While the #40 Acura ARX-06 GTP was able to wheel itself to the podium in their first race, the #40, #10, and even #45 entries did not have the smoothest of journeys to get to Sunday.

For the #10 WTR Acura, a group that came inches away from a chance at taking home a 2023 season championship, the team saw decent speed leading up to the twice-around-the-clock event. However, electrical problems created challenges for the now two-car Acura pairing in the middle of the night, resulting in both cars stalling out: the #10 at the exit of the international horseshoe and the #40 at the exit to NASCAR Turn 1.

The #45 GTD entry for WTR also ended up having troubles during the race, going to paddock almost simultaneously as the #10 GTP went in. But the car would get behind in the process, finishing towards the tail end of the field.

It obviously wasn’t the team’s weekend given the troubles that happened, but for the #40 to finish on the podium was a solid showing, especially for it being a new car and having a talent-laden group of former F1 great Jenson Button, Jordan Taylor, IndyCar star Colton Herta and Louis Deletraz.

Nevertheless, there is still something that needs to be said in regards to the question: When can Wayne Taylor Racing get back to the top of the podium?

Having not won since August 2022, something is to be said for this winless slump the team has had at the top.

Obviously, the issues that came up in a race such as this happen, but it will be interesting to see if the blue on those famed Wayne Taylor glasses suddenly sees clear skies ahead.

Final Thoughts

Looking across the other class winners, in LMP2, ERA Motorsports grabbed their second LMP2 class victory in four years, getting back on the podium at Daytona for the first time since 2021, featuring Ryan Dalziel and Dwight Merriman -- both who were on the team for that previous win -- as well as Connor Zilisch, and Christian Rasmussen.

Photo for AutoRacingDigest.com: Hunter Butler

In GTD Pro, many eyes were fixated on some of the factory all-star teams, including Corvette Racing and the new Multimatic Ford Mustangs, but the two weekends provided fans with some intriguing winners, with AO Racing grabbing pole last week, while Ferrari was able to grab the class win with #62 Risi Competizione, featuring Daniel Serra, Davide Rigon, Alessandro Pier Guidi, and James Calado.

Then in GTD, Winward Racing would have a battle for the class win with another Ferrari entry in the #023 Triarsi Competizione, but an incident between the newly christened GTD Pro #1 Paul Miller Racing BMW resulted in Winward Racing holding a solid lead, although the #21 AF Corse did contest at points.

Overall, the weekend brought back the excitement of seeing the IMSA season once more. Even if the weekend may not have gone well for some, there is definitely optimism for all about what could potentially come in 2024.

Race Notes:

* The #17 AWA Corvette had troubles starting prior to the green flag, and headed into the paddock during the race's early laps.

* The #18 ERA, #11 TDS, and AO Racing LMP2s all got into an incident at the Le Mans Chicane.

* A massive wreck in Turn 1 involved the #20 High Class Racing LMP2 and the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus GTD Pro.

* The #11 TDS Racing had a major wreck coming out of the Le Mans chicane, causing the first fallen car of the weekend.

* Both the #10 and #40 Wayne Taylor Racing come up with problems. The #10 was in the pits working on an electrical issue. The #40 had stopped near NASCAR Turn 1.

* The #01 Cadillac Racing of Regner Van Der Zande stops on track. Brings out another caution.

* The #24 RLL BMW comes back out after issues on track.

* The #01 Cadillac Racing entry had retired. Had stopped on track around the midway point of the race.

* The defending champions for the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus has retired. Was in the pits for a bit. Retires with under 9 hours to go.

* #57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG with Dontje and #023 Triarsi Ferarri with Triarsi driving exchange for the lead at the 4:15 marker. Traffic gave Dontje the advantage with the lead.

* The #1 Paul Miller BMW is experiencing brake problems. Car is still running.

* The #1 Paul Miller BMW’s tire wasn’t connecting to the wheel bearing properly. Tire was coming off.

* The #31 Blomqvist threaded the needle heading into Turn One and took the outside lane to pass Nasr in the #7 Porsche. Traffic caused the move.

* The #12 Vasser Sullivan catches on fire heading out of the pits. First caution comes out in over three hours. Jimmy Vasser said that they were experiencing a banging noise.