Acura, Shank, Helio Castroneves sweep Daytona Rolex 24 as hybrid era begins

The Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-06 team consisting of (from left) Tom Blomqvist, Colin Braun, Helio Castroneves and Simon Pagenaud celebrate after winning the IMSA Rolex 24 at Daytona. (Getty Images)

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Acura dominated the debut of hybrid engines in North American sportscar racing with a 1-2 finish Sunday at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, where Helio Castroneves and the automaker won the prestigious endurance race for a third consecutive year.

Castroneves won the 2021 Rolex in an Acura with Wayne Taylor Racing and has won with Meyer Shank Racing for the past two seasons. Castroneves, who turns 48 in May, was overcome with emotion after Tom Blomqvist sealed the win.

The Brazilian then led his teammates, including Simon Pagenaud and MSR rookie Colin Braun, over the fence in his celebratory “Spiderman” climb.

“I love climbing over the fence with Helio,” said Pagenaud, who won for the second straight year and is a teammate of Castroneves at IndyCar. Team owner Michael Shank said in the car during Pagenaud’s final drive: “Simon is driving the stint of his life.”

Castroneves admitted he got emotional after becoming the first driver to win three Rolex 24s in a row.

“It’s a very tough sport. You lose more than you win,” Castroneves said. “It touched me. That’s why I love this sport so much. It’s very hard and when you get it, you celebrate.”

Castroneves has been a big part of building Meyer Shank Racing, which has added consecutive Rolex titles and the IMSA Championship since supporting Castroneves in winning a record-breaking fourth Indianapolis 500 in 2021. MSR is now a two-car IndyCar program with Castroneves and Pagenaud and has a real rising star in Blomqvist, who was rewarded with an IndyCar test from the team after last year’s championship season.

“What a car we built; we had a duty to get it to the finish,” Blomqvist. “Then I had to take it to another level to secure the win.”

The 29-year-old British rider has earned a starring role at Honda Performance Development.

“He’s a nugget,” Shank said. “He really thinks he’s the fastest guy out there. We have been in business with Tom Blomqvist for a long time.”

Despite being the reigning champions, MSR and Acura were a little unknown prior to Daytona. The twice-round-the-clock endurance race this year marked the start of a new hybrid era in racing, and the technology shift for the premier GTP class of IMSA makes it the only motorsport series in North America to run with hybrid engines.

The move was a massive draw for automakers eager to compete in motorsport with technology related to their road cars. As such, the top GTP class doubled its manufacturers’ numbers from last year’s Rolex to four this season, from two, and Daytona International Speedway officials said attendance for the Saturday-Sunday race was the highest in 61 years.

Fans came for a showdown between some of the best automakers in the world.

Acura featured two entries featuring Michael Shank and Wayne Taylor, who worked with Michael Andretti just last month. Porsche lured Roger Penske back into sportscar racing with two cars, while BMW persuaded Bobby Rahal to move his program to the premier class of IMSA. Cadillac was strong with three entries, two from Chip Ganassi Racing and a third from Whelen Engineering.

But all preparation for launch turned into a nervous hand-wringing over durability concerns, as all nine GTP teams feared the new technologies and supply chain issues would prevent the cars from completing a 24-hour race .

“You who have little faith,” said David Salters, Head of Honda Performance Development. “Apparently our car manages 24 hours.”

Unfortunately, one of Rahal’s BMWs had an early mechanical problem and then both of Penske’s Porsches broke. It was a severe blow for Porsche, which had done all the development work for the GTP conversion to hybrid engines with Penske.

But Acura and Cadillac were able to handle their first race kinks, and a restart with less than 30 minutes remaining left both Acuras and two Cadillacs fighting for the overall win.

It was Blomqvist, the main driver for the MSR team last year, who won both the IMSA championship and the Rolex, finishing them in the #60 Acura. He held off Filipe Albuquerque in the Acura for Taylor/Andretti at the restart and Blomqvist pretty much drove to victory.

Renger van der Zande and Earl Bamber finished third and fourth in Chip Ganassi Racing, but their two Cadillacs were more than 7 seconds behind Blomqvist.

The Rolex win is the third for Shank, who turned a tiny team into a motorsportsman.

It’s been a tremendous relief for Shank, who struggles with a constant issue of disrespect for his team, which competes in both IMSA and IndyCar, and has felt tremendous pressure to deliver for Acura in this hybrid era . Shank wants MSR to be a two-car factory team, but Acura splits its two-cars between Shank and Taylor. And Taylor recently hooked up with Andretti.

Shank insisted that every session on track showed MSR is a top-level team and Blomqvist won pole, while the No. 60 was fastest in almost every session. It was so obvious that competing team owners admitted their only attempt at beating Shank was when the Acura didn’t make it to the finish.

___

AP Auto Racing: and