Chip Ganassi Racing, with Juan Pablo Montoya, finishes second in Rolex 24 At Daytona
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Chip Ganassi Racing couldn’t win its fourth consecutive Rolex 24 At Daytona as David Donohue, driving a Brumos Racing Porsche, was able to outmuscle Juan Pablo Montoya, who was driving a Ganassi Lexus.
Donohue, the son of legendary racer Mark Donohue, led the final 14 laps and finished 0.167 seconds ahead of the Ganassi car co-driven by Montoya, Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas.
Donohue, who also competed in 12 Nationwide Series races and three Truck series races for Team Rensi Motorsports in 2001, celebrated the victory with co-drivers Darren Law, Buddy Rice and Antonio Garcia.
J.C. France, son of NASCAR’s Jim France, was among the co-drivers of the third-place finishing Brumos car. SunTrust Racing finished fourth and was also on the lead lap of a race where the leaders completed 735 laps on the 3.56-mile road course.
The other Ganassi car, which included Dario Franchitti among its drivers, was fifth, five laps down.
Three-time defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson’s Bob Stallings Racing team finished 21 laps down in seventh with gearbox and rear assembly problems among the team’s issues. The Johnson car was three laps behind the entry from Penske Racing, which does not have any of its NASCAR drivers in its lineup and was running sixth.
The Childress-Howard Motorsports team, which has Casey Mears and Indy Racing League star Danica Patrick among its lineup, had handling and electrical issues and was eighth, 33 laps down.
Finishing ninth overall and winning the Grand Touring class by one lap was a TRG Motorsports' car co-driven by Andy Lally, who drove a partial Truck schedule for the team last year. Also competing in the car was Justin Marks, who competed in the Truck series as well last season.
Richard Petty Motorsports driver AJ Allmendinger and Roush Fenway Racing Truck driver Colin Braun, both driving for Michael Shank Racing, had their cars retire because of a faulty sensor that hampered their engines – a common problem, blamed on a supplier, among the Fords and the Roush-Yates engines in the event.
Among others that didn’t finish the event were the cars of Cup drivers Kyle Petty, Boris Said and Max Papis.
