DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Corvette Racing found themselves in the thick of battles for the lead in GTLM halfway through the 54th Rolex 24 At Daytona. Corvette Racing’s pair of Chevrolet Corvette C7.Rs were locked in a race-long fight in search of second straight GT Le Mans (GTLM) victory at Daytona International Speedway.
Both Corvette C7.Rs took turns leading in GTLM in the opening 12 hours. Tommy Milner was in the last third of his second triple-stint of the race in the No. 4 Corvette that he is driving with Oliver Gavin and Marcel Fässler. Gavin went from seventh at the start to third by the end of the fifth lap. Milner picked up where his teammate left off and set the car’s fastest race lap in his first three stints.
Fässler drove his first two stints at Daytona in the dark and found himself in the midst of a seven-car GTLM battle. It was the first race action for Fässler in a Corvette Racing entry in 2009. The No. 4 car was sixth at the halfway point.
Meanwhile, the No. 3 Corvette C7.R of Antonio Garcia, Jan Magnussen and Mike Rockenfeller ran fourth. Garcia and Magnussen were part of the class-winning entry in last year’s Rolex 24. Neither Corvette experienced anything approaching a major issue in the first 12 hours despite the top seven cars routinely being within seven seconds of each other.
JAN MAGNUSSEN, CORVETTE RACING NO. 3 CHEVROLET CORVETTE C7.R:
“The balance of the Corvette is quite good but right now we are struggling a little bit right when the tires are new on a restart or after a pit stop. It takes a little while to get a good balance. But after that and as soon as the tire comes up, everything comes together and the car is fast in the second part of the stint. It’s a struggle in the first half. So far so good. We’ve managed to stay out of trouble. It’s all pretty good.”
TOMMY MILNER, CORVETTE RACING NO. 4 CHEVROLET CORVETTE C7.R:
“That second triple stint… I wasn’t as happy with that one. I made one small mistake early; I locked the right-front really early in a brake zone and made contact with one of the Porsches. Fortunately it was door-to-door. There wasn’t any damage to his car or any to ours, so we got away with one. I was a bit more careful after that and wasn’t trying to be racey at all. I know it’s early but these things happen sometimes. But the rest of it was just in traffic. We’re all really close in speed and are racing well together. It feels like we’re all in the same mindset right now… nothing stupid and make our way through traffic as best we can. That’s good for now. We’re all kind of sizing each other up and finding out where we’re good and where we’re not, and vice versa.”
Source:
Corvette Racing
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