After the longest safety car period in motorsport history, due to bad visibility with fog settling over Daytona International Speedway during the night, the Daytona 24 Hours has finally gone back to green flag racing.
When the full course yellow caution was called at 00:45 local time, Laurin Heinrich led the race in the #7 Porsche, with Earl Bamber in the #31 Action Express Cadillac second and Kevin Estre in the #6 Porsche third.
The two Porsches both stopped multiple times under the 6 and a half hour safety car period, with mechanics removing front and rear bodywork of both cars at various times.
Earlier in the race in daylight, before the fog, the #6 car was involved in at least one incident resulting in contact and damage. The Porsche Penske crew timed their stops to fix any issues well, not letting the cars drop a lap to whoever was in the lead at the time and making sure they could always cycle back to at or near the front when other cars pitted.
Multiple other cars led the race during the night under the safety car, including the #24 and #25 BMWs and the #85 JDC Miller Porsche.
Either way, at the restart, the GTP class was led by Laurin Heinrich in the #7 Porsche, with Kevin Magnussen second in the #25 BMW and his teammate Robin Frijns in the sister #24 BMW third.
Bourdais, Barker, Wadoux lead other classes at Daytona
In LMP2, as the race went green, Sebastien Bourdais leads as the race got back underway in the #8 Tower Motorsports Oreca, with Gregoire Saucy second in the #22 United Autosports and Parker Thompson third in the #52 BHA PR1/Mathiasen Oreca.
Ben Barker led GTD Pro in the #64 Ford Mustang GT3, with Jules Gounon second in the #69 GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG GT3 and Ben Barnicoat third behind the wheel of Vasser Sullivan’s #14 Lexus, in its final Daytona 24 Hours.
Finally, Lilou Wadoux led GTD in the #21 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3. Robby Foley was second in the #96 Turner Motorsport BMW, with Matt Bell third in the #13 13 Autosport Corvette.
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