Mazda races on with diesel
Diesel racing program ratchets up at Mazda with prototype entries for the US endurance race seriesAfter nearly two years of development of its diesel engine program, Mazda Motorsports will field a pair of diesel-powered prototypes for the 2014 TUDOR United SportsCar Championship series beginning with the Rolex 24 at Daytona in January.
The two Mazda prototypes will compete outright against much more experienced and established teams such as Ganassi Racing, which recently confirmed an engine deal with Ford and will retain Scott Pruett for the endurance racing series.
“This is the most significant step Mazda has taken toward returning to the global racing stage since our overall victory at Le Mans in 1991,” said John Doonan, director of Mazda Motorsports.
“We’re confident that our two prototype cars will challenge the best North America has to offer.”
At this point, Mazda goes it alone with diesel, a choice that may give Mazda a fuel-efficiency advantage against turbocharged V6 and naturally aspirated V8 engines in the longer endurance races such as the Rolex 24 at Daytona, the 12 Hours of Sebring and Six Hours of The Glen.
So far, NASCAR which governs the USCC is happy to remain fairly hands offs in allowing Mazda to develop a competitive engine package that is restricted to using a production-based engine block and cylinder-head.
According to Tremblay, the 2.2-litre turbocharged diesel competition engine package is 51 per cent stock by parts count and 63 per cent stock by weight.
A key ingredient is obviously fuel, and there too continued development of a highly combustible race-grade diesel is expected.
On-going development of Mazda’s racing program will be guided by French-Canadian Sylvain Tremblay’s SpeedSource Race Engineering based in Florida.
“It will be quite the task to take this to the front of the prototype class in only our second year of competition. Mazda and SpeedSource will have a busy November and December of testing as we prepare for Daytona,” said Tremblay.
Off track, Mazda America is yet to launch the 2.2-litre diesel engine as planned in the Mazda6 sedan. Showroom deliveries have been pushed back to April.
Rumours suggest Mazda will soon follow the 6 by offering the diesel engine in its mid-size CX-5 crossover.
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