Last practice completed before the 24 hour race tomorrow

Not looking good for the C8.Rs

Many drivers & teams, after 2 days of mostly damp conditions, are relieved that the forecast for the Rolex 24 At Daytona is for partly cloudy to sunny conditions.
The corollary to that is that once the clouds clear this evening, it’s going to get very cold. Making for the coldest Rolex 24 ever.

Depending on which forecast you’re looking at, the highest temperature of the race will be about 50 degrees F (9 degrees C) about the time of the checkered flag.
The low will dip to just below freezing around 7 a.m.
Aside from concerns for keeping crews and drivers warm, the big concern over the weather for the Rolex is tires.
While the out-laps are going to be tricky and cold tires will certainly catch some drivers out, there do not to be any concerns for safety otherwise.

“With what’s currently forecast, we’re still confident that the tires will perform,” said Hans Emmel, WeatherTech SportsCar Championship manager for Michelin. “Obviously, they could take a little bit longer to warm up to as the drivers come out on cold tires from the pits.
Certainly a lot of teams will opt to double stint when and where they can to to put drivers back out on hot tires, or maybe change two tires and not change the other two, to give them some heat in the tires as they exit pit lane and go through the the infield section of the course.”

Michelin’s bigger concern for tires, notes Emmel, is mounting the tires, which can get problematic when it gets too cold.

“If the temperatures get down to freezing, we’ve put in some provisions in our mounting facility to make sure that there’s sufficient temperature while mounting the tires. That’s really where some temperature can get tricky for us.
So we’ve enclosed some areas and warmed some areas to make sure that when the tires come out of the truck through the middle of the night, it gets it’s like an assembly line through there with teams bringing us tires back, new tires going on, we’ve put provisions in to make sure that mountability is not an issue,” he said.

According to several drivers, it’s going to take most of a lap to warm the tires up enough so that they’re not sketchy, and up to three or four, depending on class and car, to get fully up to temperature.
Not only are there likely to be numerous single-car incidents on out-laps as a result, but drivers will have to be quite aware of which cars around them may have just come out of the pits on cold tires.

“The difference of speed between cars that are on their out-laps and cars that are at speed is going to be huge,” explained No. 5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac driver Tristan Vautier. “I mean, even in the infield, a GTD [on warm tires] is going to be quicker than a DPi getting out of the pits with four sticker tires.
So all in all those situations you’re going to be exposed and if you come up to speed in a DPi on an LMP3 or a GTD with a low-experience driver on cold tires, it’s going to be very difficult as well.
So it’s going to be a lot of tricky moments.”

IMSA has made efforts to “better strengthen” Michelin’s tire usage requirements this year with further enforcement aimed to keep competitors within an optimum operating window, according to Michelin WeatherTech series manager Hans Emmel.

The sanctioning body has imposed “minimum penalties” for teams not adhering to Michelin’s operational requirements that have been in the sporting regulations since Michelin became Official Tire of IMSA in 2019.

Several teams received warnings in last weekend’s Rolex 24 qualifying race for their cars not meeting minimum cold and/or stabilized tire pressures, with the Nos. 79 and 97 WeatherTech Racing GTD Pro entries and No. 16 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R all handed post-race penalties equivalent to a drive-through for repeated offenses.

Per Attachment 3 of the sporting regulations, a third violation for a car is subject to a stop plus 10-second penalty, while a penalty assessed during qualifying may result in the qualifying times being disallowed.
Unserved race penalties, meanwhile, may translate to lap count penalties.
Emmel explained that the “new initiative” of assessing penalties has been done in partnership with IMSA, which is in charge of all matters regarding the sporting regulations.

“It’s always been stipulated that the entrants need to adhere to the tire manufacturer usage recommendations or requirements,” Emmel told Sportscar365.
As time has gone on, in partnership with IMSA we’ve looked at some ways to better strengthen Attachment 3 of the sporting regulations.
As a result of that, that’s what you’ve seen in some of the bulletins they’ve released.

The tire usage documents that were released for the commercial side of the paddock S9M and S8M [tires] used across multiple series have actually not changed.
We don’t dictate what camber the teams must run.
What we do is offer a window of cambers the teams have the opportunity to run and an associated stabilized pressure.

They actually have some choices in this, which is good for the racers.
If they want to run very aggressive on camber, they’re going to have to run a higher associated stabilized pressure.
“What we’ve done by modifying the language of the usage requirements to stabilize hot pressure, that still gives the teams flexibility to adjust their starting pressure to accommodate for car balance, front/rear axle, driver level, ambient and track conditions and so on.”

Emmel explained that tire usage requirements are no different from other parameters enforced by other suppliers.
“Our tires have a tremendous amount of technology and resource and design that go into them,” he said.
They’re designed to run within a certain usage level [in] cambers and tire pressures.

That stuff is directly correlated to our simulations and our bench testing regimes.
I think it’s important for us for product integrity that teams respect those.

It’s like everything else on the car. There are some limits. The engine manufacturers might impose rev limits, turboboost limits, lubricants that have to be used.
The racers always have choices to make.
The car engineers typically don’t run the weight of the car within one gram of the specification.
They have to build their own tolerance into all of the various limits on the car.

“I think this is no different with the tires. They know where we want [them] to run. How close they want to go to that limit without being in breach of the regulations is up to them.”
While being a “touchy subject” in the paddock, IMSA President John Doonan said he’s been pleased with how the IMSA and Michelin technical teams have been able to better “educate” competitors with this year’s more strict enforcement.

“I was in a meeting [on Thursday] and said to the Michelin team and our technical team how proud I am of the process we went through,”
It’s a touchy subject but as Michelin said, they’ve made tires for years and as long as they’re properly inflated, they’ll be the greatest tires in the world like they are.
If they’re not properly inflated, there’s a potential for challenge.
I think you see clearly from [last] Sunday, and what we had to do after the race for a couple of teams that we were trying to educate through the race, and they didn’t make any changes there [after being warned].

“If you watch the race last year when folks weren’t following the [recommendations] of what could happen
None of us want that, and we also don’t want people gaining a competitive advantage by fiddling with the tire pressures.”

Michelin Prepared for Near-Freezing Race Conditions

Emmel said Michelin is prepared to tackle the near-freezing temperatures forecasted for Saturday night into Sunday morning in this weekend’s race.
Forecasts currently call for a low of 35 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius).
Teams were most recently impacted with cold weather in last November’s Motul Petit Le Mans, where ambient temperatures dipped to 39 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius) during warm up.
“We don’t think there’s any significant challenges as far as the tires,” Emmel said
Certainly the drivers will be challenged because tire warm up is going to be difficult.

Teams will react to that by doing double stints and scrubbing tires to try to help them warm up quicker.
It does need to be recognized that at 1 degree Celsius or 2 degree Celsius that we might face [Saturday night], the drivers are really going to have to be on top of their game to get some heat into the tires early without pushing past the limits.

“I still would expect that maybe by the Bus Stop they should have sufficient heat to get more and more aggressive as they go on their out lap.”
He added: “I believe it was 2020, we got as low as 5 degrees Celsius here at Daytona and didn’t see any major issues.

“When we look at the tire compound properties, we don’t expect that an extra 2-3 degrees is going to change anything significantly from a tire perspective.”
Emmel said no changes are planned to the tire usage requirements due to the frigid temperatures.
“More pressure in the tire helps get more heat in the tire quicker,” he explained.

“As you can imagine, a little bit more pressure in the tire, you have smaller of a contact patch.
“That puts more energy into a smaller area, which actually helps heat the tire up quicker.”

The 24-hour race to open the 2022 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season will see the green flag at 1:40 p.m. ET Saturday. NBC Sports has partial coverage, beginning on NBC network at 1:30 p.m. Among the pre-race storylines:

Freezing Florida:
A wind chill advisory, something Floridians rarely experience, has been issued for the early morning hours Sunday, when strong north winds will make it feel like 25 degrees. A freeze watch also will be in effect, but the latest forecasts indicate little chance of rain through the race.

Cool temperatures usually are desirable for proper grip. Cold temperatures are not. Bourdais had the fastest lap during the final practice session Friday 1 minute 34.732 seconds (135.487 mph) but that was when the ambient temperature was in the upper 50s.

“You have to accept what it gives you,” said Mike Hull, Chip Ganassi Racing’s managing director. “It will take a while to get your tires up to temperature, but that’s a relative thing for anyone
I think we saw it in the conditions we had (Friday). Conditions rapidly changed, and people adapted to it quite quickly.
I think they all learned a lot about how tires would react, particularly in cold weather.”

Chasing history:
Wayne Taylor Racing will attempt to win the race for a record fourth consecutive time, breaking the record set by Ganassi in 2008. The No. 10 WTR Acura ARX-05 – co-driven by Ricky Taylor, Filipe Albuquerque, Alexander Rossi and Will Stevens won the Motul Pole Award by winning a 100-minute qualifying race Sunday.

“We’ve done all the right things so far,” team owner Wayne Taylor said.
“We have excellent drivers and a really good team, and the weather conditions are certainly going to play a significant role in this race. Driving in 31- to 35-degree temperatures is going to make it extremely hard for guys to get out of the pits and keep it on the track when the surface is so cold. I see lots of yellows coming.”

Changing champions:
Two months ago, Action Express Racing celebrated the Daytona Prototype international (DPi) title with the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac.
The team returns for the final season of DPi with one new full-time driver.

Felipe Nasr left Action Express to join Porsche’s foray into LMDh and the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class, which will replace DPi as the top WeatherTech Championship class in 2023.
He’ll compete this weekend in the GTD PRO class, but former teammate Pipo Derani will carry on in the No. 31 with new full time co-driver Tristan Nunez and endurance specialist Mike Conway.

“It is important you have camaraderie between yourself, the team and the other driver because you have to give up so much for the greater benefit of the team,” Derani said. “When you have a good relationship with your teammate, that only helps.”

Bulging Field:

The numbers are in: A field of 61 cars and 235 drivers in five classes is set to race for 1,440 minutes in temperatures expected to drop to freezing overnight.
The rookie Palou has received his advice.

Kamui Kobayashi led a frantic opening hour of the Rolex 24 at Daytona that concluded with the first full course caution of the contest after an accident for the Era Motorsport Oreca 07 Gibson.

Action Express Racing Cadillac driver Kobayashi seized the lead from Cadillac Chip Ganassi Racing’s Sebastien Bourdais with a lunge down the inside at Turn 6.
The reigning 24 Hours of Le Mans winner then extended the gap to four seconds until Dwight Merriman went off under braking on entry to the Turn 6 left-hander 45 minutes into the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season-opener.

A corner marshal behind the spot where Merriman hit the tire barriers has been taken to a local hospital for further evaluation but has stable, vital signs, according to an IMSA spokesperson.

The caution stemming from the accident resulted in a second round of stops for the DPi field after a bout of green flag services on the half-hour mark.
Wayne Taylor Racing’s Filipe Albuquerque started the race from pole but lost his lead on the first lap to Tristan Vautier in the JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac DPi-V.R.
Kobayashi, who also got past Albuquerque in the opening exchanges, found a way past Vautier at Turn 2 as the DPi runners hit the GT traffic for the first time.
A charging Bourdais reached second before the DPi cars made their first pit stops, and emerged from the pits ahead of Kobayashi until the Japanese driver fought back ahead.

After the caution pit stops, Kobayashi led from Vautier, Bourdais, Albuquerque and Pipo Derani in the No. 31 Action Express Cadillac.
Ben Keating paced the first hour in LMP2 after fast-starting John Falb was bumped off the lead by a drive-through for jumping the opening green flag.
The class lead then changed as High Class Racing brought Dennis Andersen out ahead of the Thomas, while Keating’s PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports Oreca dropped a few places due to a driver change.

The GTD Pro and GTD front-runners were mixed in the opening 60 minutes as drivers jostled for early track position.
Mathieu Jaminet worked his way to the front of the Pro class in the Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R, while Jon Miller took charge in GTD for McLaren squad Crucial Motorsports and even led the GT field overall at one stage.

Jaminet kept the GTD Pro upper hand through the caution period, with WeatherTech Racing’s Julien Andlauer and TR3 Racing’s Rolf Ineichen close behind the Frenchman.
Jarett Andretti controlled the early stages of the LMP3 class race from pole in the No. 36 Ligier JS P320 Nissan, but dropped behind Riley Motorsports’ Gar Robinson at the caution pit stops.

How the C8.Rs are doing after 2 hours into the race

Dixon gave the No. 01 Cadillac Chip Ganassi Racing crew maximum points at the first IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup checkpoint six hours into the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

Dixon kept ahead of Whelen Engineering Racing Cadillac driver Mike Conway after a restart from a full course caution to pick up five points for himself, Renger van der Zande, Sebastien Bourdais and Alex Palou, who are sharing the No. 01 Cadillac DPi-V.R.

The caution period occurred just after midway through the fifth hour when Team TGM’s Porsche 911 GT3 R went deep into the grass run-off at the International Horseshoe and needed to be recovered.

Conway secured four points for his No. 31 Whelen-backed Action Express crew, followed by three points for Richard Westbrook in the JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac.

A significant moment in the DPi battle occurred at the start of the 5th hour, when former leader Will Stevens had a wild spin at the Turn 1 left-hander, resulting in a puncture for his Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-05.

Stevens then crawled almost a full lap back to the pits, which dropped defending winner WTR two laps off the overall lead as the only DPi car no longer on the main lap.

KCMG led the GTD Pro class at the six-hour mark with Dennis Olsen running ahead of Risi Competizione Ferrari driver Davide Rigon.

Risi moved into the lead courtesy of a well-timed pit stop ahead of a caution-ridden fourth hour, but Olsen put the pressure on Rigon over the next green flag stint.

The lead changed in the pits during the most recent caution period, when Rigon lost time due to a Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo delaying his exit from the Risi stall.

Pfaff Motorsports was third at one-quarter distance, ahead of the No. 97 WeatherTech Racing Mercedes-AMG and the sole Pro-class Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3.

1 of the early GTD Pro contenders, WeatherTech’s No. 79 Porsche, spent time behind the wall due to an air jack failure that has removed it from the podium battle.

Tom Gamble led GTD on six hours in the No. 27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 from The Heart of Racing, picking up maximum Endurance Cup points in the process.

Nico Mueller and Nico Lapierre ran three seconds apart at the head of LMP2, with the former in front of the High Class Racing Oreca 07 Gibson and the latter driving for PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports.

A close-fought LMP3 fight was led by CORE autosport driver Colin Braun with Andretti Autosport’s Rasmus Lindh and Sean Creech Motorsport’s Joao Barbosa in close view.

Additionally, an IMSA spokesperson has confirmed that all drivers involved in the multi-car accident at Speedway Turn 1 midway through the fourth hour were checked and released from the circuit medical center.


The No. 48 Action Express Cadillac, now with Jimmie Johnson at the wheel, has received new rear bodywork to replace that damaged in the contact with the No. 01 Cadillac, and a new nose, both replaced in separate stops under yellow.

The No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Porsche that was fighting for the lead earlier has taken two trips to the garage and is 38 laps down to the GTD Pro leader.

The No. 59 Crucial Motorsports McLaren 720S that stopped after contact with the No. 14 Lexus is back on track with Patrick Gallagher at the wheel, 23 laps down to the GTD leader.

Another GTD contender, the No. 28 Alegra Motorsports Mercedes-AMG has also visited the garage, and is 15 laps down.


After 6 1/2 hours of race

The No. 4 Corvette had issues, coming into the pits under the yellow, but not restarting.

The crew pushed it to the garage where they have removed a lot of parts at the rear, including the rear undertray, working on the car.


Has not returned and is 40 laps behind

C8.R Corvette Racing found itself in the thick of the GT Daytona (GTD) PRO battle following the first six hours of the Rolex 24 At Daytona with its pair of mid-engine Chevrolet Corvette C8.Rs. It’s the first race in the GTD category for the Corvette Racing program, which ran sixth and seventh at quarter-distance.

Nicky Catsburg was in his second stint in the No. 3 Mobil 1/SiriusXM Corvette C8.R following double-stints for both Antonio Garcia and Jordan Taylor to start. Catsburg was the highest-placed Corvette, one position ahead of Marco Sorensen in the No. 4 Mobil 1/SiriusXM C8.R. He followed stints by Nick Tandy and Tommy Milner, which had a slightly better pace than the sister car in the early going.

The first six hours featured four full-course cautions and abnormally cold conditions for Daytona Beach. The Corvettes also were dealing with an overall performance deficit but were staying close to the lead pack with fuel economy and pit lane strategy in an attempt to gain track position.

Corvette Racing’s next update will come at the halfway point of the Rolex 24.

ANTONIO GARCIA, NO. 3 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“It was a little chaotic but not much. We know how the race is going to be. The first restart with the LMP3s around us was a little bit different. We need to know and learn how they are on these restarts. This is still the very early stage of the race, but there are people who are being aggressive and some others not so much. So we need to stay with it. It looks like we can hold our position and keep track of the leaders more or less, which is important.
We will carry on and see how the track and race develop. We can definitely follow people, but I don’t know about catching them or leading the way. I don’t know if it will be easy or not. That’s the way it is right now.”

JORDAN TAYLOR, NO. 3 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“It is absolutely chaos out there right now. A lot of guys want to be at the front, and that’s fine with me.
They can race as hard as they want, but for us, we just need to stay out of trouble. We don’t have outright pace to battle with them. We’re good on strategy right now and saving fuel every stint to try and maximize that. But yeah, it’s chaotic.
Mixing it up with LMP3 cars and slow LMP2 cars has caused some mayhem. Throughout the night, the name of the game is staying out of trouble.
Hopefully come Sunday, we have a strong Corvette and a car in one piece.”

WILL IT GET MORE TREACHEROUS OVERNIGHT WITH THE TEMPS DROPPING?

“If we have yellows, then it will breed more yellows because the cold tires are so hard to get temp in. It wasn’t as bad as I expected, but I think it will get worse during the night. The good thing is that once the tires to get temperatures in them, the grip is actually higher than what we’ve all weekend, which is nice. So you can push the car a little bit harder.
That’s a positive but keeping out of trouble during restarts will be a huge part of it.”

NICK TANDY, NO. 4 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“So far, so good. The first couple of stints were quite good. There obviously was a yellow early when everyone needed to stop in GTD. So it was good to experience the whole field coming in together. On our side, it’s running pretty well. We’re finding that when we are in a pack, we aren’t too bad because we can draft off the cars in front.
We seem pretty strong in the infield. It just becomes a bit different when we drop off the back of the pack; it looks like some leaders seem to stretch out their legs a little bit.”

HOW MUCH ARE YOU LEARNING ABOUT THE GTD CORVETTE?

“We were learning every session. We know the car. We know a lot about everything to do with how it operates.
Furthermore, we know the tires. We’ve tested on the tires. Furthermore, we’ve tested the ABS and things like this. What we’re learning here is how everything translates and works together at Daytona with Daytona-specific aero requirements, suspension, geometry settings and tire pressures.

This was something we’ve been learning throughout the week. The key thing is getting the car to work with the tire. That can vary from track to track, how you make the most of it. It’s very different from before, where we could select the tire we wanted and effectively develop the tire around our Corvette in GTLM. Now we have to work the car around the tire we’re given, which everyone does in GTD. This is one of the key differences.”

WITH MORE CARS IN THE CLASS, IS IT DIFFERENT?

“Yep! So far, I haven’t experienced too much of it to be honest.
We had kind of a clean start, and we were more to the front of the pack. But I’ve just seen on a restart there was a mix of cars, some had pitted and some had stayed out. When there are 35 cars by design that are capable of doing the same lap time in a space like Daytona, plus the other 30 cars out there, that’s something very new for us.
It was kind of the like the GRAND-AM days when there were two separate classes. This is probably somewhat similar. In the last few years, we’ve had four or five classes and all the cars had a different spread. Now there’s a much bigger group that are all similar speed.
That was really the first time we’ve seen the grid mixed up on a restart. Hopefully it’s not going to carry on like that.”

TOMMY MILNER, NO. 4 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“It was chaotic, but honestly a lot of fun. It’s been a long time since we’ve had to race that hard from start to finish of my stint. We’re still kind of where we expected, a little slow to be sure. We’ll try to use whatever tools we possibly can. It looks like we can go a little longer on fuel, but I’m not sure if we can make up that deficit that we have on pace, but we’ll try for sure. I was really happy with the Corvette.

The first stint wasn’t great, but we made a change for the second stint, and it was much better. With the change and maybe the track conditions, it looks like our pace improved. I’m very happy with it, and it’s been great so far.
We’ll let these smart Corvette Racing engineers try to figure out how to keep us moving toward the front.”

JORDAN SAID THE PERFORMANCE OF THE TIRES WERE BETTER THAN HE EXPECTED WHEN THEY GOT UP TO TEMP. DID YOU FIND THAT TRUE AS WELL?

“Yes. From talking to other drivers in GTD in the past, this customer tire suffers a little bit more in heat, so in these conditions it’s kind of ideal for it.
For sure, it’s tough to get heat in the tire, but we’re doing our best there. But once we do, there is a lot of grip, just like Jordan said.”

Both Chevy Corvette C8.R GTDs have gone behind the wall with apparent technical problems in a major blow to the Chevrolet factory team’s efforts to claim a second consecutive Rolex 24 at Daytona class win.

The No. 4 entry from last year’s GT Le Mans class-winning team was taken back to its garage in the seventh hour and was joined by its sister No. 3 car around two hours later.

In the ninth hour, both cars were being worked on feverishly by Pratt & Miller mechanics in front of a growing crowd of on looking spectators.

A Corvette Racing spokesperson said that the team is inspecting the alternator on the No. 4 car, while the cause of the No. 3 car’s issue is unknown.
Antonio Garcia entered the pits during a caution period and parked up to allow crew members to remove the engine cover and inspect the rear of the car.

In addition to going behind the wall for more extensive checks, the Spaniard’s No. 3 entry was handed a drive-through penalty for refueling while a team member was working underneath the car.

Disaster struck Corvette Racing in the seventh and eighth hours of the Rolex 24 At Daytona on Saturday. Despite lengthy visits to the garage, both Mobil 1/SiriusXM Chevrolet Corvette C8.Rs were still circulating around Daytona International Speedway at the halfway point of the opening round of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season.

The No. 3 Corvette ran ninth in the GT Daytona (GTD) PRO class in the program’s debut in the category. Jordan Taylor was at the wheel, but 13 laps down to the class leader after the car lost time with an electrical issue that required a change of the alternator near the eight-and-a-half-hour mark. Antonio Garcia was in the Corvette when the team noticed a voltage issue on the No. 3 C8.R.

Things weren’t any better for the12th-place No. 4 Corvette, which lost nearly 2.5 hours replacing the diffuser, exhaust pipes and starter. Marco Sorensen was hit from behind while trying to avoid a spinning prototype following the race’s fifth full-course caution.

Sorensen had followed double-stints by Nick Tandy and Tommy Milner. He had to brake hard to keep from hitting the wayward LMP3 car, which also just missed collecting Nicky Catsburg in the No. 3 Corvette. Sorensen was nailed from behind, which resulted in the damaged components and sent the No. 4 C8.R back to the garage.

ANTONIO GARCIA, NO. 3 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“It was unfortunate. We were up there, probably not in the best place overall, but we were staying out of trouble.
That wasn’t the easiest thing to do with the conditions and all the mixing of the categories.

We were P4 when the team realized we had an alternator issue. Everything was going smooth and all we needed to do was make it through the night.
We’re back out there but down some number of laps. We’ll carry on and be as close to the lead lap if the yellows permit that. We knew it would be a crazy race.”

MARCO SORENSEN, NO. 4 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R:

“We got hit from behind and that caused some big damage.
There wasn’t really anywhere for me to go. There was a spinning LMP3 car ahead of us and I had to brake hard because there wasn’t anywhere I could go.
Then I got the contact from behind. I don’t know who it was. The car was fine after that.

I could still keep doing good laps, and we were still in the game. Everything was good. Then just before I came into the pits, the car fully shut off on me. When Nick jumped in, we couldn’t start it and that started a big snowball that kept on rolling with issues. It’s tough. It was a long fix.”