Acura Team Penske driver Simon Pagenaud led at the halfway stage of the Daytona 24 Hours, as the number of challengers at the front lessened during the night.
Penske's pair of Acura DPis and the pair of Action Express Racing Cadillacs are the only cars remaining on the lead lap with 12 hours remaining.
The pole-sitting Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac DPi lost 14 minutes to repairs on bodywork damaged by a delaminating tyre nine hours into the IMSA Sportscar Championship season opener.
In the same hour, Spirit of Daytona was forced to retire its Cadillac from the race after Matt McMurry noticed a misfire of the car's 5.5-litre ECR engine.
The #23 United Autosports Ligier of Fernando Alonso, Lando Norris and Phil Hanson also dropped off the overall victory trail, when Hanson picked up a right-rear puncture in the eighth hour that sheared off part of the car's body panelling.
Further delays were caused by a cylinder problem that took hold when Alonso was in the car for his first endurance racing night stint.
Acura's pair of Penske DPis emerged in front of the AXR Cadillacs during a round of pit stops just after 2 am local time.
After building a lead of around 15 seconds, Graham Rahal spun his Acura at turn one, which allowed team-mate Simon Pagenaud to slip through just before the race ticked over for halfway.
Rahal's rotation lost him enough time to drop underneath the two Cadillacs as well, with Christian Fittipaldi picking up the chase in second and Mike Conway in third.
In fifth place, two laps off the leader, was the #22 ESM-Nissan DPi driven by Johannes van Overbeek, Nico Lapierre and Pipo Derani.
In GTLM, Ford continued to hold sway at the front of the class, as Porsche had its effort reduced to one competitive car following a crash for Nick Tandy at the Bus Stop.
The former Porsche LMP1 driver lost control of his 911 RSR through the high-speed chicane and made contact with the inside wall, which was enough to necessitate lengthy repairs.
After 12 hours, Joey Hand's #66 Ford led Ryan Briscoe in the #67 Ford by seven tenths of a second, with the pole-sitting #3 Corvette two laps adrift in third.
Porsche's nearest challenger was the #912 car in fifth.
With its Penske-run operation leading in prototype, Acura also controlled the pace in GTD as AJ Allmendinger fronted the category in an NSX-GT3 entered by the Michael Shank Racing squad.
Allmendinger was only two seconds ahead of Rolf Ineichen's #11 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 at the milestone.
Land Motorsport's Audi R8, which led the race at 25% distance, was eliminated from contention by a drive-through penalty for a Balance of Performance irregularity.
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