NIGHTTIME IS CRUEL TO LIGHTNING FAST SUNTRUST TEAM

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No one was faster during the month of January at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway than the No. 10 SunTrust Ford Dallara of Wayne Taylor Racing, featuring drivers Max Angelelli, Ricky Taylor, Pedro Lamy and Wayne Taylor.

But despite clocking the month’s fastest testing lap in record-setting time, qualifying on the pole for this weekend’s 48th Rolex 24 At Daytona, and setting the fast lap of the twice-around-the-clock Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series endurance marathon itself, the SunTrust team had to persevere through multiple mechanical maladies and a fateful meeting with a concrete barrier to earn a hard-fought sixth-place finish by the time the checkered flag flew Sunday afternoon.

Perhaps darkness is to blame for the fact the SunTrust team never had a fighting chance to exploit its lightning speed over the 3.56-mile, 14-turn superspeedway road circuit. During the daylight hours Saturday and Sunday, Angelelli, Taylor, Lamy and Taylor led an incredibly trouble-free existence in the team’s efforts to bring SunTrust its second Rolex 24 victory since 2005. But once nightfall began to set in on Saturday, troubles of all kinds began to send the SunTrust Racing machine to the pits and the garage for extended visits for repairs, which gradually distanced the No. 10 car further and further from the race leaders.

After helping set the pace under rainy and wet conditions at the outset of the 24-hour affair, the troubles started, innocently enough, when Angelelli had to make an unscheduled stop during the second hour for a new set of rain tires when his right-front tire was beginning to come apart due to excessive heat. He stayed on the lead lap in 13th place, nonetheless, with plenty of time left to regain his position at the front.

But then, midway through the third hour, a freak occurrence plucked Angelelli from his forward movement. The rooftop radio antenna mount collapsed and fell into the cockpit, right into Angelelli’s field of vision. The Italian driving ace bolted into the pits for a quick fix, but fell two laps off the pace as he handed the car over to his new full-time co-driver Ricky Taylor. The antenna mount proved to need better reinforcement as Taylor was having to help keep it propped up while negotiating the Daytona circuit. He was able to pit shortly after the three-hour mark under caution so the team could make a permanent fix without losing any more laps.

Midway through the sixth hour, after taking over from Taylor and completing his first fuel-and-tire run, Lamy, the Portuguese former Formula 1 competitor and current factory driver for Peugeot at the 24 Hours of Le Mans just left the SunTrust pit with a full load of fuel and fresh tires when he slid into a concrete barrier on the pit exit road. He was able to continue, but inflicted significant damage to the right-front and rear of the SunTrust car. He headed straight to the garage for 13 minutes of suspension and gearbox repairs that dropped him five laps off the pace.

Not long after relieving Lamy during the eighth hour, Angelelli reported that the rear end of the car didn’t feel quite right. The crew directed him to the garage and ended up replacing the gearbox a second time, as well as other major driveline components. Angelelli resumed 18 laps off the pace.

All the while, between trips to the garage, the SunTrust car was able to turn some of the fastest laps on the race track even though the team’s hopes of winning had essentially vanished well before the race’s midpoint. And the troubles would continue in the overnight hours.

Midway through the 14th hour, Lamy reported gearbox troubles once again and brought the SunTrust car to the garage. In addition to a third gearbox change, the crew also had to replace the left-side driveshaft before Angelelli took over and resumed in 10th place, 44 laps down. One final visit to the garage less than an hour later, when the crew noticed via onboard telemetry that the gearbox oil temperatures were beginning to spike, dropped the SunTrust car to its largest deficit of the race—47 laps—to the leaders.

Once the darkness began to turn to light on Sunday morning, the SunTrust car’s troubles would be behind it with more than eight hours of racing left. At one point, just after dawn, Angelelli showed his and the No. 10 car’s mettle when he drove up behind the first- and second-place cars, picked them off one-by-one, and left them in his rearview mirror.

He turned the race’s fastest lap of 1 minute, 41.101 seconds (126.764 mph) in the process. As the SunTrust driver lineup rotated through the cockpit the rest of the way, attrition came to the rescue and enabled the team to leave move up in the order and end up with a relatively successful points day despite its unusual array of mechanical troubles.

“I think this is such a great team,” said team owner, two-time Rolex 24 winner and three-time sports car racing champion Wayne Taylor, who put the exclamation point on the sixth-place finish by driving the car across the finish line to take the checkered flag. “Everybody works for one thing, and that’s to be successful, and they never give up. There is so much respect amongst this group, as well as all of our partners—SunTrust, Toshiba, Roush Yates Engines—it’s what we do. It’s all we do. I’ll say this, and I mean this: I’ve never known my team to be more prepared than they were for this race. But it’s always those little things that take you out in a 24-hour race, and we had more than our fair share of those. We proved we had the best car. We have the best team. And that bodes well as we move forward from here.

Angelelli, who co-drove with Taylor to the 2005 Rolex 24 win en route to that season’s Rolex Series championship, had one of the many smiling faces in the post-race revelry despite the disappointment of having such a fast car and having to settle for a sixth-place finish.

“It’s quite rare to have such a fast car all the way through a weekend and leaving the weekend without a win,” Angelelli said. “It was such a good car, it was really upsetting. But we’re happy because, despite all of the bad things that happened to us, we finished sixth and that leaves us looking good for the championship. I’m enthused about Ricky. He did everything so perfectly, so incredibly perfect. We can’t forget that, for him, this is his first real race as a regular driver with a championship-contending team. I’m looking forward to the season with Ricky. We will have a lot of fun.”

The younger Taylor, who made his Rolex Series debut just two years ago when he co-drove the SunTrust car to a fifth-place finish in the Rolex 24, turned competitive laps throughout his three double driving stints and left no doubt the team would be able to mount a strong run for the championship once again.

“This SunTrust Ford Dallara was really, really unbelievably strong today,” said the 20-year-old Taylor. “It was just a shame for a little bit of bad luck through the night just ruin it for us. It’s the 24-hour, it’s expected to have some bumps. But I felt so strong during the race. Hopefully, we can have a solid season for the rest of the year. All the worries, all the uncomfortable feelings, are gone. I’m ready to get to Homestead (for the next race) and get the season going. I was in the motorhome during all of our major problems, so I didn’t get to see everything that was going on. But going through four gearboxes is unheard of. Hopefully, I didn’t have anything to do with that. But the car was so strong, and it’s just a shame we weren’t there at the end to fight for the win.”

Asked his opinion about his son’s performance, Wayne Taylor deferred.

“That’s difficult for me to talk about, personally, because he’s my son and I don’t want to say things that would come across as biased,” Wayne Taylor said with a laugh. “I guess what you should do is ask Max, and Dallara, and Ford, and the rest of the team. Ask them, because I know what I think.”

Finally, Lamy heads back to the Peugeot Le Mans program after his second Rolex 24 with the SunTrust team, wondering just what might have been.

“We had many problems,” he said. “And I made a big mistake going out of the pits on cold tires. I touched the barrier, and then we lost some laps there and kept losing laps with the other things. It was a terrible race for us from that standpoint because the car was very fast. If we could have finished without so many problems, we might have won the race. But that is a part of these kinds of races. This is a very good team and I think they will go on and have a great year.”

The new No. 9 Action Express Racing Porsche Riley team, a spinoff of the Brumos Porsche team that won last year’s Rolex 24, took the checkered flag today, 52 seconds ahead of the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates BMW Riley. They were the only two competitors to finish on the lead lap. There were 13 race leaders in all, including the SunTrust car, which held the point for seven laps. The lead-lap cars covered 755 laps, or 2,687 miles. The SunTrust team finished 44 laps down.

Round Two of the 2010 Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series will be the Grand Prix of Miami at Homestead Miami Speedway on Saturday night, March 6.

SUNTRUST RACING LEADS FORD-POWERED MACHINES WITH 4TH

Image by Getty Images via DaylifeAnother 24 hours at Daytona is in the racing books, and after a long day and eventful night of racing, it was SunTrust and Wayne Taylor Racing that led the way for the seven Ford-powered machines entered into the famous endurance race.

“We are happy coming out of here in fourth place,” said Wayne Taylor, team owner and driver of the No. 10 SunTrust Ford Riley. “We got good points and we know now we have a good package. We have run 24 Hours so we should be able to finish the 2:45 [races]; our sites are on the championship. That is what it is all about for us.”

This was the first race with Ford power for Wayne Taylor Racing after making the switch from Pontiac last season.

“Coming out of last year, we really had an up and down year but we ended on a pretty high note, continued Taylor. “Coming to a 24 Hour with a car you have never actually run for 24 hours is a challenge. Add to that the change in engine manufacturer switching to Ford power and that was another massive change so coming in there were a lot of unknowns.

“Last night about four or five hours in, John Maddox [Roush Yates Manager of Cammer Engine Programs] told me that it was possible that none of the Ford engines might finish. We spent about an hour talking about it amongst everyone and realized it was negative energy. We decided there was no point in worrying about it because if it was going to happen it was going to happen. So we said lets go race. If you take that perspective then this fourth-place finish is great, but we come here to win. We knew we couldn’t do anything about it so we just decided to fight and go race. Maybe we got lucky or maybe there wasn’t any problem at all.”

The rest of the Ford machines weren’t as fortunate as the SunTrust No. 10 to complete the entire race with the other six Ford entries experiencing the same electrical issue, resulting in early exits from the race.

“Our preliminary indications are that a common component failure related to the electrical systems was the problem in six of the Ford powered cars during the race,” said Pat DiMarco, Ford Racing vehicle dynamics and electronics supervisor. “The lone Ford-powered car to finish the race, the SunTrust Racing entry, was running the same part as the other Ford cars batch that failed during the race. We will continue to investigate this problem and work to correct the problem for the next race.”

SUNTRUST RACING'S PRODUCTIVE ROLEX 24 TEST

Image via WikipediaThe No. 10 SunTrust Ford Dallara team of Wayne Taylor Racing completed three days of testing on the Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway 3.56-mile road circuit Monday afternoon in preparation for the Jan. 24-25 running of the traditional Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona.

Max Angelelli and Wayne Taylor, who co-drove SunTrust to victory in the 2005 Rolex 24 en route to that season’s Rolex Series championship, took to the track for eight test sessions spanning three days with new co-drivers Brian Frisselle and Pedro Lamy. They also got their first taste of Ford power under the engine cover of the SunTrust Racing machine, which had been powered by Pontiac since SunTrust joined the series in 2004.

By all accounts, it was a productive three days for the SunTrust team, which posted the third-fastest lap among the 52 car-and-driver combinations that took to the track during Saturday’s afternoon session. The lap of 1 minute, 42.331 seconds (125.241 mph) was the SunTrust team’s best over the three days and was the 12th-best lap of the test overall. The No. 10 car was fourth-fastest in Saturday’s opening session. From Saturday afternoon forward, the team settled into endurance mode in preparation for the 24-hour race and cycled through its driver lineup testing various endurance-oriented components and setups unique to the event.

“It was tough with all that we had to get done,” said Taylor, the three-time sports car racing champion who also won the 1996 Rolex 24. “As always, you come here and you’re limited on time. You’ve got to get, in our case, two new drivers integrated. We’ve never run a 24-hour with this car. Plus, we made an engine change since last season. So there were a lot of things that we needed to run through. Overall, we come out of here with a much better understanding of where we need to be. I’m sure everybody is looking at the timesheets thinking we were struggling. But that’s not the case at all. I honestly think we’re in a good place after this test. I feel good that we’re leaving here with a lot of information for when we come back. Clearly, we’ve got a great driver lineup. Brian is going to be just fantastic this year. He gives great feedback and he is very calm and really is gentle on the equipment. Pedro is our European superstar guy and he’s also very good on the equipment. Max, as usual, is a pain in the rear (grin), but he’s the best. I can tell you that I don’t remember feeling like I’ve had as much fun as I’ve had these last few days driving the car. And the real uplifting factor for our team is that none of this would be possible without SunTrust. They stuck with us after a tough year last year, and that’s really what motivates us more than anything.”

The veteran Angelelli, who will be paired with Frisselle as his full-time co-driver for the 2009 season, also felt optimistic for this year’s 24-hour race after the SunTrust team’s work during the past three days.

“I think all of us are very comfortable in the car and with the way things went during the test,” Angelelli said. “We kept working hard on a lot of different things in the short time that we had, and I’m very pleased with the progress we made as far as getting the car ready for a 24-hour race. We really didn’t have the time to show any great speed, as far as I’m concerned, but I know there’s a lot more there and we’re doing everything we can to make it work for us on race weekend and show everybody what this car can do in a 24-hour race. No fear, we believe we have everything we need to be fighting for the win here once again.”

Frisselle, the 25-year-old from Aspen, Colo., who scored his first career Rolex Series victories on back-to-back weekends last August at Montreal’s Circuit Gilles Villeneuve and Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International, has taken little time to gel with his new teammates and is getting more and more comfortable with the SunTrust team’s still relatively new Dallara chassis and Ford power.

“I think the whole team came in with the idea of getting the car ready for the 24-hour and I think we accomplished that,” said Frisselle, who co-drove with Mark Wilkins in the No. 61 AIM Autosport Ford Riley in 2007 and 2008.

“You don’t need to have the fastest car. We do have a quick car, but I don’t think it’s the fastest, yet. But it’s good and consistent and not too difficult to drive, and that’s really the key for the 24. I think the whole SunTrust team came here with the goal of making a good 24-hour car and I think we accomplished that. Definitely, I’m more comfortable and confident with the car—just getting to understand the feel and the limit of the car. And the more I work with the team, the more I feel comfortable and confident with them. So every session in the car is positive for me, and every moment I spend with the team is good. We have a good working relationship. Max, Wayne and Pedro are all great teammates to have, so it’s been really nice. I think we all like similar things in setups, so there are no conflicts there.”

For Lamy, the 36-year-old from Portugal who is a veteran of Formula 1 and, most recently, the European Le Mans Series as a factory driver for Peugeot, the three-day test was his first career taste of the Daytona circuit, as well as the Dallara chassis, which the SunTrust team introduced to the racing world just last March at Homestead (Fla.) Miami Speedway.

“I think things went quite well,” said the first Portuguese driver in history to score a Formula 1 championship point.

“I took things pretty slowly and carefully as far as trying to learn as much as possible about the track, the car and the team because everything here is new for me. It’s a very organized team and a very nice team to work with, and hopefully we can keep making the car quick for the race. It’s a demanding track. The car is very nice, too. It seems we are still looking for the best setup, but I’m sure we can have a winning car when we come back for the race.”

To give an indication of the competitiveness of this year’s Rolex 24 field, the fast times of the top-16 Daytona Prototypes were all within 1.003 of a second of each other. The top-five laps dduring the three-day test were clocked by:

1. No. 58 Brumos Porsche Riley (Darren Law, David Donohue, Buddy Rice, Antonio Garcia) 1:41.733 at 125.977 mph

2. No. 6 Michael Shank Racing Ford Riley (Michael Valiante, John Pew, A.J. Allmendinger, Ian James) 1:41.760 at 125.943 mph

3. No. 55 Level 5 Motorsports BMW Riley (Scott Tucker, Christophe Bouchut, Ed Zabinski) 1:41.859 at 125.821 mph

4. No. 22 Alegra Motorsports BMW Riley (Carlos de Quesada, Ryan Dalziel, Jean-Francois Dumoulin) 1:41.916 at 125.751 mph

5. No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Lola (Nic Jonsson, Ricardo Zonta, Darren Turner) 1:41.967 at 125.688 mph

The 2009 Rolex 24 At Daytona is set to begin at 3:30 p.m., Jan. 24, with the Fox network and Speed-TV combining for 17 hours of live coverage. Practice and qualifying for the 47th annual event begin Jan. 22.

MUSTANGS DOMINATE KONI SPORTS CAR CHALLENGE TESTING OPENING DAY AT DIS

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REHAGEN RACING, ICY/PHOENIX RACING STRONGEST IN GS AND ST RESPECTIVELY IN FIRST OF THREE TEST DAYS
Daytona Beach, Fla. — Ford Mustang GTs were the class of the Grand-Am Kon Sports Car Challenge field in Saturday's Roar Before the Rolex 24 test session at Daytona International Speedway, sweeping the top six Grand Sport practice times on the first of three test days to open the 2009 campaign.
The lead car belonged to Ken Wilden, who set the fastest time of 2:00.918 (105.989 mph) late in the afternoon session in the No. 59 Rehagen Racing RehagenRacingProducts.com Ford Mustang GT. Wilden passed fellow Rehagen Racing driver Nick Gullatta, who had set a time of 2:01.262 (105.689 mph). James Gue, the 2008 KONI GS runner-up with Bret Seafuse, was third on the charts in the No. 37 JBS Motorsports Trumansburg Shur Save Ford Mustang GT, followed by Hugh Plumb and Jack Roush Jr. in the No. 61 Horsepower Ranch Sunset Hills Vineyard Ford Mustang GT; Matt Plumb and Mike Canney in the No. 60 Horsepower Ranch Sunset Hills Vineyard Ford Mustang GT; and Bryan Ortiz and Roberto Bengoa in the No. 57 Rehagen Racing Ford Mustang GT. In Street Tuner (ST) competition, Kristian Skavnes was quickest of the two practice sessions, setting a best time of 2:11.162 (97.711 mph) in the No. 111 ICY/Phoenix Racing Subaru Legacy.
Overall, 30 cars made on-track appearances. Sunday's Kon Sports Car Challenge practice begins at 11 a.m., and the final session ends at 3:45 p.m.