2019 Rolex 24

Fantastic image.

 

Times change, so it's maybe not relevant......but the 1965 12 Hours of Sebring wasn't stopped for what was arguably a MUCH more difficult event. Autoextremist talks about this week....

 

Back then, safety was not the issue it is today, and races were run to conclusion, without safety cars or full-course yellows (or reds) and regardless of conditions. Consider Stewart's 1968 win in the German GP in horrendous visibility on the Nordschleife. Ask Sir Jackie today and he'll agree that they would not even start the race today under those conditions.

 

Just a few months ago Augusto Farfus won the GT World Cup in Macau and now the Daytona 24. BMW should be regretful for not rehiring him for the DTM.

The move that decided the race:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BtMvDwaAdjF/

 

IMSA Rolex 24 at Daytona 2019: Full Race Recap | NBC Sports (45min 25sec)

 

Many of the drivers, team members and media all had flights together on Monday for the Bathurst. I doubt finishing the race later would have been doable.

 

What happened with AF Corse?

I could have sworn I read they were coming with a two-car 488 team but don't see mention
of them anywhere in the results, etc.

BHW

 

A few other night shots from Daytona. Still have a lot to go through. Posting more of these to FB and IG if anyone is interested in following along.

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Those photos are amazing!

 

Fantastic photo's. Kudos to the photographer.

 

Quick question, when I see R24 pictures I never see many people in the stands.
In the rain there seem to be no spectators at all.
What is attendance like?
Le Mans is always very busy, but outside F1 are motor racing gates very low these days ?

 

Thank you!

 

The rain started around 4:30am and the race was red flagged around 7:30am. The rain photos I have posted are from that time period. Not many people were dumb enough to be out in it. lol

But Saturday the infield was absolutely packed. All the infield grandstands were full and people were standing 4 rows deep around the side of the track. Aside from the start and end of the race not many people hang out in the main stands. I have been to Daytona 3 of the last 4 years and each time the crowd is bigger and bigger.

 

That is sort of the way it has always been at Daytona for the 24 Hours.

There are people in the stands, usually scattered around throughout but I'm sure there are
sections that are cordoned off where there is no access. In good conditions, there may be
a couple thousand people in the stands mainly for the start and a lot would gather in the
high reaches at night as that affords a view of the entire circuit.

Most of the fans camp out in the in-field portion but with the expansion of the paddock and
other facilities, the amount of available space has been greatly reduced. They talk about
100K people being there but that's a Rose Bowl size crowd factoring out the track surface
itself, the square footage all those RVs take up, etc. the real number is more likely in the 30K
area.

During the depths of the GrandAm era (when president Roger Edmundson came out and stated
"We don't care about 'traditional' sports car fans" and "We want to make the cars irrelevant"), they
invented their new "man on the street" fans, even the infield was practically abandoned and areas
the size of a football field that used to be covered in RVs and fans were empty and still DIS insisted
there were 100K people there.

DIS security is so uptight about their facilities being overrun by crazed camped out fans and credentialed
media members that they more than go out of their way to make the entire experience as unpleasant
as possible.

And, while the crowds have come back for the more relevant racing, they're still not getting these
100K type numbers that they may have gotten during the height of the GTP era in the 80s through
early 90s, and even then there were empty seats in the grandstands.

It was to the point where I showed my photography work to the then Communications Director of
IMSA when their offices were in Tampa. Her comment was why I didn't have images of the cars
where all the empty seats weren't visible. My come back was, "Why not just put cardboard cutouts
of people in the stands and we wouldn't have that problem any longer?" She didn't like that.

Imagine the overwhelming reasoning for DIS to paint all the seat backs different colors was to give
the illusion of people in the stands. To a degree it works and for DIS it's okay. They hardly lift a
finger to promote the 24 Hours as their entire focus is on the 500 when the place (and the entire
town) gets turned upside down. To DIS, the 24 Hours is an inconvenient necessity and a mere
warmup for what's to come.

Sorry for the long answer, but it bears explanation.

BHW

 

Funny your comments on DIS security. I remember one year back in the early 1990's when the Jag's were still racing some people tried to build a rather large bond fire. That was funny to watch as the SWAT team(DIS) swarmed in. Sebring has even put a stop to most of the antics that college kids used to try, but they are very layed back compared to the Daytona jack asses. I try to not go to Daytona if possible ever. I understand Homestead is ok also, but that could be because they don't have to deal with huge crowds like Daytona on NASCAR weekends. Last time I went to Homestead for a race the place was a ghost town. In general I find anything connected to NASCAR full of absolute douchebags!!

 

I could write volumes on DIS security, which is made up mostly of local retirees given tin badges
by the front office and told to make life as miserable for paying fans and credentialed media as
possible.

The rain on Sunday reminded me of the '96 Finale. The rain had been moving in off the Atlantic
in an unnamed storm most of the previous night and it came down in buckets just as the green
flag dropped.

I shot from the first Horseshoe turn at the start. My car was twenty yards away and the guy at the
gate let me through no problem. Mind you, I'm trudging around with 100lbs of camera equipment
that I'm trying to keep dry and my car is within sight of the gate.

On trying to exit the same infield gate and get to my car, the same security guard says I can't go
out the gate. I told him I just came in the gate. He says "No you didn't". Later, rinse, repeat.
He points to another gate 100 yards down and under 2' of water the way and tells me I have to
go out that gate.

So, tin badged Cletus wins, I have to walk through a field of standing water carrying $25K worth
of camera equipment. This is typical of the BS you have to endure at DIS.

BHW

 

+1

I did not encounter any IMSA, DIS or Team employee with a negative attitude. I would argue that IMSA very much has a fans first attitude and tries to make it as pleasant as possible for us.

@BartonWorkman when was the last time you came to the 24 out of curiosity?

 

Rolex 24 second-placed GTD penalized



IMSA has penalized the second-place Land Motorsport GT Daytona team for a minimum drive-time infraction from last weekend’s Rolex 24 At Daytona.

The penalty moves the No. 29 Audi R8 LMS GT3 to the back of the GTD field in the official results, promoting the No. 12 AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 to second in class and elevating the No. 88 WRT Speedstar Audi Sport entry to third.

Land driver Ricky Feller was found to be afoul of the drive-time rule, which specifies the minimum and maximum amount of time drivers must spend behind the wheel to earn points and, in this instance, comply with the rulebook. In a class like GTD where a mix of professional and amateur drivers share each car, the drive-time regulations are used to ensure the professional do not fill the majority of the available seat time while also safeguarding the interests of the amateurs whose time in the car might otherwise be reduced to the smallest number possible.

According to a statement from IMSA, “Minimum drive-time for the GTD class at the Rolex 24 was four hours, 45 minutes and base drive-time was three hours, 30 minutes. Both times were reduced by a percentage commensurate to the time lost while drive-time was stopped for red flags during the event.”

Citing the sporting regulations that govern drive-time requirements, IMSA added more specifics to the situation with Land’s Feller: “Two drivers rated silver and/or bronze must individually achieve the minimum drive-time and each other driver (regardless of Driver rating) must individually drive the car for a base drive-time as listed in the SR or Car penalized in the drive-time penalty order priority.” It’s believed Feller was 15 minutes short of meeting the minimum drive-time obligation.

Scuderia Corsa’s Toni Vilander was also penalized for a drive-time infraction. Having crashed late in the race, his No. 63 Ferrari 488 GT3 was classified 14th in GTD and was not running at the finish. The No. 63 has also been moved to the bottom of the results.

https://racer.com/2019/01/31/rolex-24-second-placed-gtd-penalized/

 

Pics

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I will give them the benefit of a doubt but I have never seen that side of them at Daytona. Also IMSA are not as nice as the ALMS people were. For example the new IMSA people are very touchy about photography during tech. Back in the ALMS days they would bend over backwards for you and allowed you to take as many pictures as long as the team did not complain and you stayed out of the way. Sebring is also really easy going and other than some crazy fans have never seen anything bad at that track. I do like the Daytona banking and I do think NASCAR has changed it's tune, but not because they wanted to but because they had to. By the way I have been to more Florida races than most Floridian "race fans" over the years and have thousands of photos to prove it.

I remember 1996. What a horrible weather year. That was the year the EB110 Bugatti and Luigi Viper showed up along with the new GTS-R Vipers first race.

 

Were those taken by you?

 

Negative. Someone close to the RISI team.

 

Gotcha. I have some really good ones of the Risi car I still need to edit. I hope they are going to run more races than last year. GTLM just isn't the same without them.