2025 ROLEX 24 RACE DIARIES: HOURS 10-12

on January 26, 2025

The 2025 24 Hours of Daytona is underway, and I’m here to document the race and my experience as a sportscar fan over the course of the 24 hours. With updates every three hours, I hope to tell this legendary race’s story as the platinum era continues into 2025

.The lead battle continued as Porsche, BMW and Cadillac slugged it out. The no.31 swapped out Jack Aitken for Fred Vesti, Laurens Vanthoor replaced Nick Tandy in the no.7 who lost out to their rival in the pitstops. Dries Vanthoor ended his stint with an undercut attempt, before handing over to Phillip Eng.

GTD Pro also turned up the anti with Fred Vervisch being hunted down by Luca Stolz’s no.69 Getspeed Mercedes and Rexy, who’d fought back to third in the class thanks to defending IMSA champion Laurin Heinrich.

The no.81 Dragonspeed Ferrari of Thomas Neubauer had an off slamming into the tyre barrier at the International Horseshoe before continuing, the car sitting sixth in class.

Another GT car was involved in strife, this time the no.36 DXDT Corvette spinning out of the bus stop chicane and bringing out a full course yellow from seventeenth in class, as the no.48 went back behind the wall.

On the restart, it was Fred Vesti who took the green flag in the no.31 Cadillac, but he wasn’t able to hold it. Phillip Eng swept round the outside on the tri-oval to take the race lead for the no.24 BMW. Felipe Albuquerque took second place for the no.10 Cadillac as the no.4 of Nicky Catsburg battled with the no.64 of Seb Priaulx gave chase in a Ford V GM battle. Vesti fell down to fourth having also lost a place to Kevin Estre.

Toby Sowery fought with Oliver Rasmussen and Paul Di Resta for the lead of LMP2 as GTD Pro swapped back to a Ford 1-2 with Paul Miller Racing’s no.1 machine joining the lead battle. GTD was between Daniel Mancinelli’s no.70 Inception Ferrari and the Heart of Racing no.27 Aston Martin of Zacharie Robichon.

Huge drama occurred as after running at the front of the race for a long while, Fred Vesti crashed against the wall on the banking eliminating the car from contention and bringing out another FCY. Vesti desperately tried to get his car back to the pits but to no avail, the car was practically a write-off. From three Cadillacs, only the no.10 car remained in with a shot at overall victory.

On the restart it was the sole remaining Cadillac of Filipe Albuquerque who assumed the lead of the race ahead of the chasing Porsche’s of Kevin Estre in the no.6, Pascal Wehrlein in the no.85 and Felipe Nasr in the no.7 as a three minute penalty was doled out to the no.25 for an improper wave by procedure, losing it nearly 2 laps and plummeting it further down the order. Both factory backed Corvette’s also got stung with drive through penalties in GTD Pro. In LMP2, it was Inter Europol’s no.43 car that led the way with Antonio Felix Da Costa. Maddison Snow took the GTD Pro lead in the no.1 Paul Miller Racing car, and in GTD the Wright Motorsport no.120 of Elliot Skeer found itself back in the lead of that class.

Then, the GTD Pro no.14 Lexus went behind the wall after issues with Aaron Telitz bringing the car into the garage.

Nico Pino then pulled into the pits with his no.85 Mustang Sampling Proton Porsche, after receiving damage to the rear suspension. Such was the implications of that damage that it went behind the wall after a really strong run.

The biggest mover in GTD Pro saw Shane Van Gisburgen climb from the mid-pack to second, with the kiwi having an eye for victory.

More drama was to come in the GT categories, Cetilar Racing’s no.47 Ferrari coming to a halt agonisingly in the middle of the pitlane, just outside to his pit box. The attempts to restart the car in the pits were in vain, and so it was decided to take the car behind the wall.

At time of writing, it’s Felipe Nasr who leads the race overall, ahead of Porsche Penske teammate Matt Cambpell. Rasmus Lindh leads LMP2 in the no.22 United Autosports car ahead of Tom Dillman for Inter Europol. GTD Pro is headed by Neil Verhagen for BMW’s no.1 Paul Miller Racing Entry and it’s still the no.120 car leading in GTD with Ayhancan Guven.