MOTORSPORT: Ford GT's first big day arrives

The Bathurst 12-Hour is only a week away now, but before that there’s another, bigger endurance race –15,000km away and twice as long.

The Daytona 24-Hour in Florida will mark the race debut of Ford’s new GT supercar – the start of the path leading the Blue Oval back to Le Mans in France mid-year – and with Australian Ryan Briscoe one of its drivers.

The twin-turbocharged 3.5-litre V6 Ford GT performed well in what could be called its competition debut, a three-day trial dubbed ‘The Roar before the 24’ on Daytona’s 5.696km road course early this month.

Now comes a truer test, real racing in the GT Le Mans class – one of four in the Rolex 24 at the historic Florida oval track.

The Blue Oval’s new global racing flagship -- of which only 250 a year will be built for the road, all in left-hand drive -- is up against two other newcomers, BMW’s M6 and Ferrari’s 488, both also turbocharged, as well as updated Chevrolet Corvette C7.Rs and Porsche 911 RSRs.

One of America’s endurance classics – along with next month’s Sebring 12-Hour, also in Florida – the Daytona 24 is a most international race.

The entry list comprises 13 sports car prototypes including the improved Deltawing DWC13, eight identical ORECA-Chevrolets in the prototype challenge class, 11 GT LMs and 22 in the GT Daytona (GTD) class, less sophisticated than the LMs and running to international GT3 rules.

The 54 cars represent 12 manufacturers and have almost 220 drivers from 22 countries.

Most cars have four drivers, some three, some five, and all but three entries have driver line-ups with mixed nationalities.

A few drivers will fly straight out of Florida for Sydney and the Bathurst 12-Hour on February 5-7.

Among them will be Rene Rast, the German called in to replace the injured Craig Lowndes in a Melbourne Performance Centre Audi R8-LMS, and Toni Vilander, a Finn who has been a class winner at Le Mans, has a Ferrari factory contract, and will drive for Maranello Motorsport at Mt Panorama, along with ex-F1 countryman Mika Salo.

There are four women drivers in the Daytona field and five New Zealanders.

Kiwi V8 Supercar star Shane Van Gisbergen is making his third start in the Daytona 24 in an all-new Alex Job Racing Porsche 991, after coming within 10 seconds of class victory last year, and Richie Stanaway is in an Aston Martin V12 Vantage - both of them in GTD.

Earl Bamber, an outright winner at the Le Mans 24-Hour last year in a Porsche 919 Hybrid, is there in a Porsche 911 in GT LM and – like Van Gisbergen – will be rushing to Mt Panorama for the 12-Hour after Sunday’s chequered flag.

Brendon Hartley, a teammate of Aussie Mark Webber in the World Endurance Championship-winning Porsche 919, is at the wheel of one of iconic American team owner Chip Ganssi’s Ford-engined Riley prototypes.

NZ’s Indycar champion Scott Dixon is in Ganassi’s other Riley looking to repeat last year’s Daytona 24 victory in that car’s swansong as Ganassi bows out of sports prototype racing.

Ganassi’s endurance focus now turns to the Ford GT, two of which he will run in a full US championship this year and another two, with the assistance of Britain’s Multimatic, in the WEC.

In all, the Blue Oval’s new weapon will race in 10 countries this year.

Its debut comes in the 50th year since Ford’s historic first outright victory at Le Mans with its GT40, toppling Italy’s mighty Ferrari – then a tiny Italian company that had famously rejected the Detroit giant’s buyout overtures.

Ganassi has 120 people on the new project for the two championships the GTs will contest.

Mike Hull, managing director of the Ganassi racing operation that also includes IndyCar, NASCAR and the American-based Global Rallycross Championship, says he feels at Daytona “like being at the bottom of the Himalayan mountains with a group of Sherpas that are trying to help you get to the top”.

“We have a big climb on hour hands here,” Hull told racer.com.

“Whenever you find territory that is uncharted, which GT racing is for us, it is very difficult to have complete confidence in where you are going to go. But, at the same time, you have enormous confidence in your people on that journey with you. And the process.”

Hull said that most important was “to be able to react to change quicker than your competition”.

Already the Ford GT’s fuel tank has been reduced by five litres – from 98 litres to 93 – under a ‘balance of performance’ review by officials since ‘The Roar’.
“This GT LM class is one of the most competitive categories we have ever been in. Perhaps that is the unknown,” Hull said.

“Nobody has called [from Ford] and said they expect us to win.

“You look at the commitment they have made, the resources they’ve made available, the partners that have become involved [including Ford’s top NASCAR operation Roush Yates preparing the engines], and that’s the statement.

“The intent to win has been made through actions, not with words.”

The Ford GTs will have three drivers each at Daytona but two for the rest of the American season.

Briscoe, a Sydneysider based in the US for more than a decade and a multiple winner in IndyCar and sports cars there, will have Brit Richard Westbrook as his co-driver all year, with German Stefan Mucke brought in from the new Ford WEC squad to partner them at Daytona.

American Joey Hand and Frenchman Sebastien Bourdais, another IndyCar and sports car ace, are the regulars in the other GT to race in the US, with another German, Dirk Muller, added from the WEC line-up for this event.

Hand and Bourdais are previous outright winners of the Daytona 24.

It’s a race the Ganassi team has won six times in the past 10 years.

The Ford GTs won’t feature as outright contenders, although the GT LM cars are expected to mingle among the prototypes challenge cars on the crowded track, with the top prototypes fighting it out for overall victory.