No Poles Needed, No Team Orders, Persevering Teams and Conquest’s Conquest
By David Phillips
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Don’t believe your lunar calendar. And certainly don’t believe your eyes when you look to the heavens tonight. Both may agree that the moon is currently in a waning crescent phase and the next full moon – the Sturgeon Moon – won’t occur for two weeks.
But anyone who witnessed Sunday’s IMSA SportsCar Weekend will attest it was THE most chaotic race in the 2024 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. So far. Not only were Road America’s four miles of macadam frequently littered by broken bits of race car ranging from mirrors to full rear bodywork, at times it seemed there were more cars on pit lane serving drive-through penalties than competing on the racetrack. Not surprisingly, the winners in all four classes finished with largely intact bodywork and somewhat clean slates for good behavior on the track and in pit lane.
Here are three takeaways – plus a bonus fourth – from the race.
Pole Position? We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Pole Position!
It never hurts to start a race up front, especially with championship points awarded based on qualifying results. But when it came to the real business at hand – the race – pole position proved of little significance. None of the four class winners started from pole, indeed only one of the victorious cars – United Autosports USA’s No. 2 ORECA LMP2 07 in Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) – started from the front row. In the other three classes, the No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963 gridded seventh in Grand Touring Prototype (GTP), the No. 96 Turner Motorsport BMW M4 GT3 started fourth in GT Daytona (GTD) and Conquest Racing’s No. 35 Ferrari 296 GT3 qualified third in GT Daytona Pro (GTD PRO).
In the case of GTP, the qualifying/race results disparity continued a curious trend dating back to the 2023 Chevrolet Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, the last race won by a pole winner. And in the case of LMP2, Road America marked the fourth race in succession that AO Racing’s No. 99 ORECA was unable to translate Saturday’s Motul Pole Award form into a “W” on Sunday.
An EZ Decision
So the question of whether Roger Penske would have, er, strongly suggested that Mathieu Jaminet move over in the No. 6 Porsche in order for teammate Felipe Nasr to take the win and thus bolster the No. 7 Porsche’s championship points lead was never really answered. Of course, the fact that Jaminet and Nasr raced one another hard, but not too hard, in the closing laps is proof positive that Penske did not issue any team orders on that front.
And the fact that the No. 01 Cadillac Racing Cadillac V-Series.R of Sebastien Bourdais – at the time the closest competition for the No. 7 Porsche in the standings – was rapidly falling down the running order in the closing laps – a result of front-end damage sustained earlier in the race – made the decision lots easier, if not a moot point altogether.
On the Rebound
The LMP2 win was a welcome reward for the United Autosports team in the wake of what could have been a disastrous Saturday that saw Ben Keating tattoo the unyielding concrete barrier on the exit of the high-speed Carousel in practice. Not only did the United mechanics repair the damaged ORECA in time for qualifying. Keating responded by putting it on the front row in qualifying before he and Ben Hanley duly worked their way to the front to collect the team’s first IMSA win, one that leaves the drivers and team fourth in the increasingly tight LMP2 standings.
BMW M Team RLL was not rewarded with a win, but the crew nevertheless deserves credit for repairing the No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8 after a similar misfortune in practice on Saturday. Although they prudently skipped qualifying and thus started 10th, Jesse Krohn and Philipp Eng worked their way up to a seventh-place finish.
Whadya Do for an Encore?
A tip off the hat to Eric Bachelart’s Conquest Racing, which saw Daniel Serra and Giacamo Altoe pilot the No. 35 Ferrari to an impressive GTD PRO win in a one-off appearance with the team. Although the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW kept the Conquest entry honest in the closing laps, the fact remains that Serra and Altoe led the order most of the race and, but for being pretty tight on fuel, had a largely un-dramatic run to the checkered flag.
“It’s unbelievable,” said Bachelart. “I hadn’t met Giacomo before until last Thursday. He was highly recommended by our other driver. And both drivers have done an amazing job. Obviously, we know Daniel, he is one of the very best in GT. But this is the first time we enter two cars and the (second) time to enter GTD PRO. So, to win the race today, I can’t believe it. I’m so happy and so excited about it. It’s amazing.”
The only way Sunday could have been better would have been for Conquest’s “regular” entry – the No. 34 Ferrari of Manny Franco and Albert Costa Balboa – to have taken top honors in GTD. In fact, in the middle stages of the race, the Conquest Ferraris held first place in both GTD PRO and GTD before the No. 34 Ferrari slipped to sixth spot at the finish. Nevertheless, Conquest holds down fourth place in the GTD team standings (with Franco and Balboa tied for fifth in driver points) as the WeatherTech Championship heads south for the Michelin GT Challenge at VIRginia International Raceway on Aug. 25.