The first major auto racing event every year is the Roar Before the 24, a practice session, qualifying, and a prototype race, all in preparation for the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona.
For 2020, the Roar was the weekend of January 3rd through the 5th. This event provides the race teams with practice and testing time on the race track where first race of the IMSA season is held as part of a world-famous 24 hour endurance race for sports cars.
Friday was a gray day, bad for photos but the track was dry and the teams all got a lot of track time. Roger Penske, who will be the honoree at the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance in 2020, had his immaculately prepared prototype Acuras ready for the event.
Daytona International Speedway has very nice garage spaces for each of the cars. At the Roar, the cars spend a lot of time in the garages as tweaks are made in the setups to find that extra .010 second of time on the track. It is all about extracting the most performance from the machine.
The Whelen Cadillac moved out of the garage to be in line to get on the track for the next practice session. This is always a front running car for the overall win.
Three team members were working on the Whelen car. The process of tuning the car has changed greatly as technology has been added to race cars. Tuning used to involve turning wrenches and changing carburetor jets. Today, the cars don't even have carburetors, but they do have computers. More tuning is done by the computer engineer than the mechanics. The setups must be very secretive. This team member closed the computer screen when he saw that I was taking a photo. He did not want me to capture the data on the screen.
There are also Acuras in the GT category, cars very similar to the street cars. Here again, the computer is the tuning tool.
The biggest buzz at the racetrack and in all the automobile media, was the first public track time for the new C8 Corvette, the first mid-engine Corvette. There was always a crowd in front of the Corvette garages.
Although an American car and an American race team, the driver team is an international. The cars, and here where the team has decorated their garage, on the large wall poster, have the drivers identified by name and flag of their nationality. Jordan Taylor, a Floridian, is the one looking toward the camera. Much planning, time, and investment is goes into setting up the garages to make them professional in appearance and equipment, and highly functional.
In the Ferrari pit, the computer is being used as the tuning tool. This car, like the Acura above, is in the GT Daytona class. Four different classes of cars are run as part of the Rolex 24 Hours.
The green LED number is controlled by IMSA. During practice or the race, it displays the running position of the car. Makes for good information for the fans watching the race. Here, with the car not on the track, it is displaying the car number, 63. It may be easier to read in the next image.
The Weather Tech Ferrari in its pit garage, partly in the garage. This mechanic was running the engine and probably wanted to keep some of the fumes and carbon monoxide out of the garage. Take a look at the green plate on the rear wing.
Note all the chamfered holes and the two Allen head screws. The angle of the rear wing is still an adjustment made mechanically, using a wrench. Count the holes and begin multiplying all the possible combinations of attack angle and height to understand how many positions are possible. A greater attack angle means more downforce and bettter tire grip when cornering, but more drag and lower top speed on the straights. Tuning adjustments are always a compromise.
The Lamborghini is a street car that appears more like a full-on race car - low roof height and sleek design. It is also part of the GT Daytona class. IMSA has a Balance of Performance formula that adjusts power or fuel capacity to allow cars with different aerodynamics and power plants to compete on an equal footing. One of the reasons there is a Roar Before the 24 is to allow IMSA to gather data on the cars to adjust that balance.
There is a unique feature on this Lamborghini, even more than the paint scheme - the driver team is four women; Christina Neilsen, Katherine Legge, Tati Calderone, Rahel Frey, from four different countries - Denmark, Great Britain, Columbia, and Switzerland.
 |
| IMSA Photo |
An IMSA photo will be used to display the paint job and graphics. The bright colored cartoon book like graphics are a one-off for just the Roar. The graphics are different on each side of the car.
The Wynn's Mercedez technician working intently on the car's tuning. He can start the car, change gears, and work the throttle right from the keyboard while recording information. Detailed information is downloaded after each practice session to compare car performance and each of the drivers.
This car is parked in a different area of the pits. It is entered in the Michelin Pilot Challenge, a sponsor-driven name of a race that occurs on race weekend, but is not part of the Rolex 24 Hours race. This group of cars, with three different classes will run a 4-hour endurance race on the Friday of the 24 Hours. The Challenge cars have their own set of garages, not quite as plush as the set of garages where the Rolex cars are assigned.
The Minolta Cadillac is a multiple winner of the Rolex 24 Hours, including last year's race. The car is prepared and fielded by Wayne Taylor Racing, a Florida-based race team.
The only team member working on the car when we visited was the computer engineer.
Another of the classes is LMP2, LeMans Prototype. It is an Oreca-Gibson, French-built race car with a 600 hp Gibson V-8 engine built in England. This car is designed for a racing class in Europe. All cars in the class are the same, with sealed engines. It is a class designed for amateur racers, often referred to as "Gentlemen Racers." Still requires a massive team and special equipment to be able to race. Note the custom bracket for the jack attached to the front of the tub.
The faster and more technical of the GT cars is the GTLM, Grand Touring LeMans. For 2020, there are only 7 cars in this class, two Porsches, two Corvettes, two BMWs, and one Ferrari. This is one of the Porsches. Note the big aerodynamic diffuser under the back. This would not fit on a normal 911 Porsche since the rear engine is located there. A quirk in the class rules allowed Porsche to move the engine forward, making a mid-engined car. This car won the class championship last year.
Again, the only mechanic is the one working the keyboard.
Note the LED number light in the window. It is displaying 12 as the car's race number rather than position on the racetrack. It is red, rather than the green noted on the Ferrari. The different colors denote different classes. There are Porsches racing in both GTD and GTLM. The GTD cars display green numbers, and the GTLM red. Allows one to easily distinguish between cars in the two classes, particularly when racing at night. The same hold true for the two prototype classes.
The Roar also provides the stectators to take in the sights and sounds of the cars on the track. This video is posted to gives a small insight to the sounds. Unforunately, much better sound equipment is need to capture accurate sounds than the small microphone on our point-n-shoot camera. But, you can get the idea. The 6-cylinder Porsches have a much different sound than any of the other cars - it is a scream. And, this year it is piercing and painful. Must remember to take hearing protection.
The normally aspirated V8 Cadillacs have the traditional deep rumble of American V8 engines. The new Corvette lost the rumble this year as a new engine with a flat-plane crankshaft has changed the firing order resulting in an even sound rather than the rumble. In addition to the camera not catching the sound with accuracy, blogspot does not allow the size or placement of videos to be adjusted. But, you should get the idea.
The international horseshoe corner is a favorite place to watch the cars on the track. The cars slow to 40 mph to negotiate this corner, giving a longer view than a location where they are traveling 140 mph. The Corvette drivers and crew were successful in using the practice sessions to lower their lap times during the three days of the Roar.
The gray skies caused the camera to lower the shutter speed to gain enough light, resulting in photos of fast cars being blurry. The sun had peaked through for a few minutes allowing this shot to be a bit clearer. If this continues to be a hobby, a DSLR camera needs to be on the shopping list. Right is our capture of the cartoon-like graphics on the Gear Team Lamborghini.
Our favorite paint job is the lumberjack plaid on the Canadian Pfaff Porsche. This year, with a new sponsor desiring a silver background for their logo, the plaid does not cover the entire car, but it still gives a very different image of a racecar. This is another area where technology has made a change in racing. Imagine how long and tedious a job it would be to paint a plaid pattern. Well, they don't use paint anymore, the new technology opening up many more options.
The Wynn's car we visited in the pits is on the track in this image. Wynn's is a long-time race car sponsor beginning on Indianapolis cars before WWII. It was then branded Wynn's Friction Proofing as their only product was an engine oil additive. They have expanded their product line and shortened their name. Here, our point continues on the varying paint jobs.
Another of the GS class cars in the Challenge race, another Mercedez. Look closely at the 56 number panel, you will find the class designation "GS" right next to it. Here a bronze-gold color dominates the paint job. It is not paint - it is plastic, a wrap it is called. A large sheet of plastic is printed with the color and the graphics and then applied to the car, using a heat gun which causes the plastic to shrink to fit.
The other car on that team, the #65 car. The black areas have been swapped with white so the cars carry the same bronze-gold color scheme, but are easily differentiated by the race team members as they view them on the track.
This Mercedez is not painted, one of the tasks left to be accomplished before race weekend. To add color and sponsor recognition, a chrome red horse, the logo of Mobile Oil was placed over the rear wheel arch.
In keeping with the European tradition of sports car racing, the British term "livery" is used as the term denoting the color and design scheme used on each car. It would appear that this car is sponsored by the University of Florida in its orange & blue colors.
This discussion of the Roar and the preparation for the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona will end with a couple images of the Cadillac prototype cars which have been so dominating in this race over the past few years. The Minolta Cadillac in this image.
A different team, Whelen, fielding another Cadillac.
Many teams, many cars, a lot of preparation for the first major race of the 2020 season.
