Daytona 24h: Porsche triumphs after epic duel with Cadillac

It was Porsche’s 19^th overall win here – it has four more as an engine supplier – and Penske’s first triumph here since 1969.

The race boiled down to a straight duel between the #31 Cadillac V-Series.R – run by reigning series champions Action Express Racing – of Pipo Derani, Jack Aitken and Tom Blomqvist and the #7 factory Porsche 963 of Dane Cameron, Matt Campbell, Josef Newgarden and Felipe Nasr.

Blomqvist, who was on warmer tires after pitting three laps earlier, passed Nasr for the lead with 72 minutes remaining in a three-wide move around a GTD Ferrari.

Nasr then reported a “massive vibration” over the radio, and he fell back by 3.7s before Blomqvist suffered a major moment at the International Horseshoe cost him 1.3s – which proved how hard the leaders were pushing as the race entered its final hour.

Blomqvist then caught the #6 Penske Porsche of Mathieu Jaminet, which was running fourth, to put it a lap down that allowed Nasr to catch up again.

But just as their duel was heating up again, a fire aboard the GTD class #12 Lexus RC F at pit out led to a restart with just over 30 minutes remaining. Nasr jumped ahead of Blomqvist in the final pitstops, as he needed less fuel – and the Porsche’s bugbear of slow tire warm-up was negated by a handful of laps behind the safety car.

Nasr pulled away at the final green, swerving to break to tow to Blomqvist, to keep the lead. Blomqvist hovered within a second of Nasr, appearing to wait for his chance in traffic to strike.

With 20 minutes to go, Blomqvist increased the pressure as they got into the GTD stragglers but Nasr held his nerve. The gap was half a second with five minutes to go, with Nasr visibly on the ragged edge at Turn 1 especially, but the backmarkers fell kindly for him on the last lap.

The winning margin was 2.112s.

Behind them, the #40 Acura ARX-06 took up the reins for Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti when the #10 sister car suffered an electrical issue as darkness descended on Saturday evening, after leading the opening hour, that required some rewiring.

Louis Deletraz, who shared with Jordan Taylor, Colton Herta and Jenson Button, hit Jaminet at the first corner of the restart, but was squeezed at the apex so got away with it and claimed third.

The #6 Porsche – which had led for a while on Sunday morning – bounced back from multiple penalties for failing to adhere to its powertrain parameters caused by a software issue. Kevin Estre then suffered a time-consuming off at the International Horseshoe on his out lap with four hours remaining, which happened just after a nose change.

BMW’s challenge faltered on Sunday morning, as both of its cars were struck by gremlins just when it was emerging as a serious contender for a podium finish.

The #24 M Hybrid V8 stopped at the exit of Turn 3 just before the 14-hour mark with a power steering issue and needed a flatbed to recover it back to the garage (after a failed attempt at towing it), where it was joined by the #25 sister car at the end of Hour 15 due to gearbox problems.

The #01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac that ran strongly for the first half of the race fell out of the race at end of Hour 14 with powertrain problems that caused Renger van der Zande to park up at Turn 1.

The car had got back up to fourth place at that point, but its problems began when Sebastien Bourdais went off having struck some debris that punctured a tire just before half distance.