had a great time today with the Continental tire series. Sad to see the 2 miatas drop out of ST competition. If Mazda would only give the little cars another 40hp or so they would have a championship car. They just dont have the top end they need to conquer all
Friendly reminder for those who were there: Continental Challenge coverage isn't on Speed Channel until next weekend, and it would be awesome if I were able to stay ignorant of the results until then... 
Link to the results on Grand-Am.com (well, a press release about the winner anyway.)
From what I'm told, it was a great race with an unfortunate ending. There were 2 laps to go after a caution, but there was a big pile-up during the last segment so the race finished under caution.
I saw flashes of color, but was working the booth and the welcome table while the action was happening. No pics from me today...
Pictures of the winning car and 2nd car
This is the best break I can imagine, a few good beers, great company (don't let it swell your head wbjones), cool cars, great racing, wonderful food and the main event starts tomorrow.
The ending was a mess, but a good outing for several friends who regularly help us with the magazine: Rum Bum Racing took the GS win (Ed Senf, who has helped us with many dyno stories, does their engine management), Charles Espenlaub and Charlie Putman finished fourth in GS (Charles wrote our story about catching on fire and has helped with several other pieces), James Clay finished 16th in GS (James has helped us with several BMW stories), and Andy Lally finished second in ST (Andy contributed to our recent Speed Secrets piece).
Tomorrow brings another day of racing, and we have more tours planned: 10:00 am and midnight. Come join us! In fact, I just had dinner with three of my assistant tour directors.
Several other GRM regulars--and some semi-regulars--will be in the 24, including the Nonnamaker brothers (Team Sahlen Mazda RX-8, Patrick Long (Flying Lizard DP), Charles Espenlaub (Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8), Andy Lally (TRG Porsche 911), David Donohue (Action Express DP) and Randy Pobst (Mitchum Motorsports Porsche 911). Don't be bashful about saying hi to them.
f86sabjf wrote: had a great time today with the Continental tire series. Sad to see the 2 miatas drop out of ST competition. If Mazda would only give the little cars another 40hp or so they would have a championship car. They just dont have the top end they need to conquer all
What's funny (maybe) is that just a few years ago, the MX-5s were really, really stout, especially at Daytona. In fact, that was tonight's after-dinner conversation.
I HAVE GOT TO DO THIS. Daytona 2012 is now scheduled and firmly implanted in my brain
bruceman wrote: I HAVE GOT TO DO THIS. Daytona 2012 is now scheduled and firmly implanted in my brain
2012 is the 50th running. Count me in for that one as well!
GO STEVENSON MOTORSPORTS......heard they had some issues w/ the GS continental series car. Hopefully they can have a better showing in GT.
I came close to running JG over yesterday with our Taylor Dunn and a load of nitrogen bottles but he was just too quick.
hahahaha hes quick allright . You should have seen him throw out the raffles. He musta been hungry
and I might add for good reason. The food was really good!!!
http://www.magnusracing.com/live-blog/2011/1/29/2011-rolex-24-at-daytona.html
Chip Ganassi's team wins again with a 1-2 finish!
Observations:
Joey Hand is AWESOME and Montoya is a thug.
The 01 car wouldn't have won without the kid's stellar performance and the 02 car would have won without the damage incurred by a driver with a few chips in his tummy.
Congrats to TRG and Andy Lally for the GT win. And, it's nice to see Spencer Pumpelly get another Rolex, if only because his dad was a successful racer and businessman who (indirectly) helped me make a pretty good living.
Except for all the FCY's, this year's 24 was a damn good race.
We just got out of the post-race press conference. You know, I have never met Scott Pruett, but he comes across as a very nice guy and Ganassi sounds like a guy who just has total faith in his crew. Congrats all around.
We saw lots of tired and happy people after the race. Now we nap.
One more observation: Can you imagine the amount of mainstream press this event will get when Dempsey's team finally wins it?
Yes, our girlfriends will finally start watching racing with us!
True. He is so dreamy.
He is our genarations Paul Newman so to speak. I'm a big fan of Dempsey Racing.
All kidding aside, yes, he's definitely a giant fan of the sport. Glad to see the team do well this weekend, too.
Thanks to all at GRM for putting on another fabulous weekend, I know you guys barely get to see anything of the racing so I wanted to make a point of thanking one and all who put this on.
Steve
David S. Wallens wrote: True. He is so dreamy.
My wife commented that Pruett gets out of a car looking like a movie star and the real movie star gets out looking like he just got out of jail.
Kudos to them anyway. They damn near won and McDreamy really put in a solid drive.
I got to talk to Martin Brundle post race. He was really disappointed that they weren't on the podium. A consummate racer, and a really good guy, he was just pissed at the end that they were in fourth. Nevermind that they were on the lead lap and within seconds of the leader after 24 hard fought hours, that wasn't enough for him.
It was really cool to meet all of the legends of motorsport that were at the 24 this weekend.
Oh, and sorry to Steve that we didn't meet up again, I passed out in the press center, and when I woke up, the sun was up... I should have set an alarm.
Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: My wife commented that Pruett gets out of a car looking like a movie star and the real movie star gets out looking like he just got out of jail.
We were in the back of the press room and could still see Pruett's smile during the post-race conference. He looked and sounded way too fresh for a guy who just ran a 24-hour race.
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