We’re another day closer to the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship’s racing return at the IMSA WeatherTech 240 At Daytona.
The two-hour, 40-minute race at Daytona International Speedway will broadcast live this Saturday, July 4, on NBCSN, the NBC Sports App and TrackPass on NBC beginning at 6 p.m. ET. IMSA Radio also will have live radio coverage throughout the weekend on IMSARadio.com, in addition to Sirius channel 216, XM 210, Internet 970 for the race.
And with transporters already beginning to arrive in Daytona Beach, here’s another round of check-ins with some teams and drivers competing on Saturday night.
Van Der Zande: Racing “Quite an Addiction”
If you’re not one, it’s sometimes hard to put yourself in the mind of a professional sports car racer. But two-time Rolex 24 At Daytona overall winner Renger van der Zande is shedding some light.
The Dutchman will be back with Ryan Briscoe behind the wheel of this year’s overall-winning car at the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the No. 10 Konica Minolta Cadillac DPi-V.R. for Wayne Taylor Racing. For both drivers, this has been the longest drought they’ve gone without racing.
“To be honest, there’s no life without racing for me at least,” said van der Zande. “I would always jump in the go-kart or do something else like an oval championship in Holland, which nobody knows about. I would say it’s quite an addiction to go racing.
“This time it’s a little different where it felt I was not losing out of not being at the track because nobody was at the track. It was really a nice way to get your head out of the racetrack like the rest of the world and make sure you, you can have a good relaxing time with your family with all that.”
Briscoe recalled his longest time out of a racecar was from September 2005 to December of the same year following a terrifying incident in IndyCar at Chicagoland. But even then, he recovered and was back testing three months later.
Tandy, Makowiecki Reveal 2020 Goal in Final GTLM Season
Impacts from the coronavirus pandemic have reached far and wide and unfortunately, the Porsche GT Team was not spared. It was announced earlier this month that 2020 would be the final WeatherTech Championship season for the two-car GT Le Mans (GTLM) squad.
When No. 911 Porsche 911 RSR-19 co-drivers were asked about their goals for 2020, they were likeminded.
“When you know it’s the last season for us in IMSA, you want to make it the best possible,” said Frederic Makowiecki. “Nick (Tandy) and me, we want to win the championship, it’s something we would like to do. We’ve got some great races, great wins of the big races, Nick more than me, but we didn’t get the championship. So, that’s what we will try to do. Our competitors won’t make our lives very easy, but we are prepared and we want to fight.”
“It’s the same as Fred,” agreed Tandy. “The one thing that I’m missing from my years in IMSA is the championship. I’ve won a couple obviously with Porsche in the manufacturer’s (championship), which is awesome. But to have a driver’s championship would be a number one priority.”
No. 912 Porsche “Definitely Out for Revenge”
It appears that finishing second at the Rolex 24 didn’t sit well with the No. 912 Porsche GT Team, just one place behind the No. 24 BMW Team RLL BMW M8 GTE.
Returning to the scene of the crime five months later, albeit for a shorter, two-hour, 40-minute race, co-drivers Earl Bamber and Laurens Vanthoor are wanting more in their Porsche 911 RSR-19.
“Obviously if you say to anybody that you’re finished second at the Rolex 24, they’d figure you’d be happy, which we kind of were,” said Vanthoor. “We were obviously fighting for the win the whole race and then basically lost out to BMW. We were slightly disappointed, obviously, when you get that close, but just not enough.
“We’re definitely out for revenge. It’s been a long break for everybody. It will be strange, I guess, for everybody to go back to work and then on a very tight schedule. It’s going to be a challenge for everybody, but I think there, we can hopefully play our strong cards and they’ll make good results.”
Nicknamed “Bamthor,” the two drivers are defending GTLM champions, a memory which Vanthoor holds dear.
“I think there’s this one picture,” he continued. “We have the Porsche where I’m in the arms of our mechanics and we’re all screaming and then half of us crying for joy. It just shows the emotion and the power of will which we had to achieve that.”