It’s nice to live in Daytona Beach. You can lull yourself to sleep late at night as a world-class field of sports cars audibly battle just a couple of miles away in the Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway. It was a good run, perfect weather, a race that saw the Cadillac DPi team grab the overall win for the fourth consecutive year, Mazda taking an impressive second and the Acura camp fuming after a difficult run. We outlined the BMW M8’s prospects in the race last week, and once the green dropped, the GTLM class settled into a race-long battle that saw BMW edge a pair of Porsche 911 RSR 19s, the class win materializing when works Porsche driver Nick Tandy got passed before the final round of pit stops.
The Weissach-bred Porsche works team with Tandy as its lead driver hung on to finish second in class in what was the Rolex 24’s most forcefully contested category. The 911 RSR 19 is powered by the largest horizontally opposed engine ever installed in a 911, displacing just under 4.2 liters and capable of 515hp. It’s water-cooled and mated to a six-speed sequential-shift transaxle. Its tailpipes are atypically located ahead of the rear-wheel openings to accommodate a large, revised rear diffuser that was developed for this generation of the RSR, which dates to 2019.
Jim Donnelly On Wheels 