DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The Cadillac sports car owned by NASCAR president Jim France won pole position at the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona but was later disqualified during inspection, leaving the most popular car in last place in its class at the start of America’s most prestigious endurance race.
Action Express Racing’s Jack Aitken won on the speed pole, but lost position when the No. 31 car failed inspection due to the rear skid pad friction surface being outside the allowed tolerance. The disqualification leaves Cadillac at the bottom of the top GTP class, pushing one of the two Acuras owned by Meyer Shank Racing to the front in Saturday’s doubleheader at Daytona International Speedway.
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France owns NASCAR, the IMSA sports car series, the Daytona track and the disqualified Action Express car. His car this weekend consists of regulars Aitken and Earl Bamber, Mercedes Formula 1 test driver Frederic Westey and rising NASCAR star Connor Zillisch.
Zilisch is a 19-year-old Cup rookie who won the Rolex class title in 2024, but this is his first time competing at the top level. Action Express team manager Gary Nelson held his breath when he sent Zilisch out for night practice last weekend because he wasn’t sure his experience level was high enough to manage the close rates between the top cars and slower class cars, especially in the dark.
Zilisch is flawless.
“He calculated his risks very well. He wasn’t in trouble, or he wasn’t driving our car yet,” Nelson said. “We had him on the track with 55 other cars for almost an hour in the evening and obviously I was worried because we were driving the fastest cars because of the traffic and we were constantly passing cars and a lot of times the other cars couldn’t see us coming.
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“You have to be able to get through traffic without hitting anything or getting hit. After training, I made a point of talking to him right after he got out of the car to see if his blood pressure was up or if his adrenaline was up, and he just asked ‘So what time is dinner?'”
Now, the teenager must help drive the Cadillac through the crowded GTP field.
Rolex marks the unofficial start of the motorsport season, which this year features 60 cars from 12 different car manufacturers and 228 drivers from 32 countries, but no clear favorites.
Porsche Penske Motorsport is looking for its third consecutive win in the event, once again with a completely revamped lineup. The No. 7 Porsche 963 driven by Roger Penske has won races in two different lineups over the past two years, with Felipe Nasr being the lone holdover from the past three years.
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Last year, Nasr was paired with Nick Tandy and Laurens Vanthoor, and the trio defeated its sister car, the No. 6 car, and Meyer Shank Racing’s No. 60 Acura in the final hour to give Porsche its 20th overall win at Daytona.
But the Brazilian has new teammates this year, with France’s Julien Andelaur and Germany’s Laurin Heinrich. Fanthoor was moved to sixth and will share driving duties with Frenchman Kévin Estre and Australian Matt Campbell.
Meyer Shank Racing has created a lineup for its No. 60 Acura that harkens back to the “Star Racing” era when Chip Ganassi Racing fielded talent from across the spectrum of motorsports. This year’s No. 60 car consists of four drivers with a combined 10 Rolex wins.
Shank regulars Colin Braun (four wins) and Tom Blomqvist (two), six-time IndyCar champion Scott Dixon (three) and NASCAR driver AJ Allmendinger (who was the last driver to win at Shank in 2012) dominate the field.
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Almendinger, now 44 and the second-oldest driver in the NASCAR Cup Series, was brought back by team owner Michael Shank because Shank believed Almendinger should win multiple Rolex watches during his career.
“The drivers are not our problem,” Shank said of his two-car Daytona effort.
Cars that will start from pole position include four-time IndyCar champion Alex Palou, previous race winner Renger van der Zande, as well as Nick Yelloly and Kaku Ohta.
Earlier on Friday, Palu was ordered to pay McLaren more than $12 million in compensation after he pulled out of two different deals with McLaren amid a breach of contract dispute. He signed twice to move to McLaren IndyCar but ultimately decided to stay in Ganassi.
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This is the 17th time Allmendinger has appeared in a Rolex watch.
“I know AJ jokes a lot, but he knows the game. He doesn’t know much about racing, but he knows how to handle traffic, how to race at night,” Shank said. “He’s very loyal to me and this team. That kind of loyalty is unheard of. I just want him. I just want to win one more time with him because he should have won four times now.”
Cadillac will compete against four different teams, including three from Wayne Taylor Racing, which is now affiliated with TWG Motorsports. That allowed Andretti Global to send Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson to Daytona in one car, while Colton Herta, who is leaving IndyCar this year to compete in the F1 feeder series, to drive another car.
The Action Express is the fourth Cadillac.
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